From Huizhou Engraving Traditions to Late-Qing Literati Drinking Cards: Artistic Features and Media Transformation in Ren Xiong’s Liexian Jiupai

Abstract

Drinking cards were implements used for drinking games in ancient China. The Liexian Jiupai is a complete set of drinking cards. It was drawn by the late-Qing painter Ren Xiong and engraved by Cai Zhaochu. This article analyses its artistic features and functional changes and discusses its relationship with the Huizhou woodblock engraving tradition. In addition to literature analysis and comparative art-historical analysis, manual visual coding was conducted on the complete set of drinking cards to analyse their composition, inscriptions, linework, blank space, and narrative methods. The study finds that, although Liexian Jiupai was produced in Xiaoshan, Zhejiang, its collaborative production method between painter and engraver, refined and flexible line engraving, narrow vertical format, and integration of text and image were borrowed from and adapted from the late-Ming Huizhou woodblock engraving tradition. The drinking cards removed monetary rankings and fixed divisions of information, allowing greater freedom in the arrangement of figures, inscriptions, and scenes. At the same time, animals, objects, and human actions in stories of immortals were transformed into recognisable visual clues and combined with drinking rules. Liexian Jiupai retained the practical and social functions of drinking cards while strengthening the aesthetic qualities of independent prints. It reflects the integration and transformation of late-Qing drinking cards between popular visual culture and literati art.