Clay Sculpture (Huishan Clay Figurines)

Wuxi clay figurines are called Huishan figurines because their making and selling centered on the Huishan area. The craft began in the late Ming, with specialized workshops appearing in the Qing, giving it several centuries of history.

Figurines fall into coarse and fine types: coarse pieces depict festive, auspicious themes in bold shapes and bright colors, while fine pieces are hand-pinched portrayals of opera characters and legends. The fine works use dark clay dug a meter deep from Huishan paddy fields, shaped through rolling, pinching, molding and trimming, then richly painted, as the saying goes, three parts sculpting and seven parts color.

Huishan figurines are a leading example of folk painted sculpture in the Jiangnan region, with figures like the chubby Da Afu widely beloved. In 2006 the craft entered the first batch of the national intangible heritage list.

Workshops and display spaces cluster around the Huishan Old Town, the heart of where the figurines can be seen and understood.