The Woodside Library hosted a Mid-Autumn Calligraphy and Lantern Making event on Sunday. This year, the Mid-Autumn Festival, a key part of Chinese culture, falls on Oct. 6. The holiday celebrates the new harvest and full moon with a variety of festivities and traditions.
Cynthia Lian, a local calligraphy teacher who led the workshop, taught calligraphy brush techniques. Lian introduced popular characters for the Mid-Autumn Festival, like 喜樂 (Xǐlè), meaning happiness, and 中秋 (Zhōngqiū), meaning mid-autumn. She also provided participants with mid-autumn themed stickers and drawings of the rabbit and the moon for inspiration.
“This is a very special festival, so I designed stickers specially for this event. The stickers are about the Mid-Autumn Festival, like Chang’e, the bunny, the moon, and osmanthus flowers,” Lian said.
To construct their lanterns, participants were given wooden frames, tassels, lights, and string, all provided by Lian. She instructed participants to glue their calligraphy papers on the inside of the lantern frames before attaching them to each other. Finally, Lian showed everyone how to add the tassel and lights to the inside of the lantern.
“I think it’s a great way to get the community together,” participant Kathy Liu said. “Also, I think it’s a good way for American-born Chinese, who don’t really have as many opportunities, to do new kinds of things in the community.”
Lian’s company, JanJin Calligraphy, is run by her and her husband. They host workshops every week around the Bay Area. “At the beginning, it was just a hobby to write calligraphy and do artwork, but after that, we hosted some workshops and formed our own company,” Lian said. “We were both raised in China, and we want to bring that culture to the U.S.”
You don’t have to have any experience at all to start doing calligraphy. “You have to have interest because calligraphy is about practice, and practice makes perfect. As long as you are enthusiastic, then you can do a great job,” Lian said. “It is really inspiring to me that beginners who have an interest can make good art. That is why I started my company—to teach.”
