Ink Smoke

The fourteenth year of the Republic of China, Shexian County, Huizhou. The pine soot in the Shen family's ink studio never settled. Nineteen-year-old Shen Yan was the last ink maker in the family, masterful in every traditional step of making Huizhou ink. Bold and sharp-tongued, she was best at arguing and trading barbs with Gu Qinghe, the painter lodging in the studio. Their bickering kept the little courtyard lively day after day. Back from studying abroad, Gu Qinghe advocated modernizing the designs and wanted to incorporate new painting techniques into Huizhou ink. He complained every day that Shen Yan clung to old methods and refused to change. Shen Yan chased him with her carving knife, scolding him for not understanding the immense labor of burning soot and pounding ink, or the weight of the old ink manuals passed down through generations. Everyone saw only two bickering frenemies laughing and teasing each other. No one knew of the heavy fate hidden beneath all that merriment. Western fountain pens and machine-made ink flooded the market, and fewer and fewer people wanted handmade Huizhou ink. Of the entire traditional ink-making process, Shen Yan was now the only person who could reproduce it. Every day, she pretended not to have a care in the world while shouldering alone the burden of watching a thousand-year-old piece of intangible cultural heritage slowly disappear. Gu Qinghe had burdens of his own. His school's techniques for restoring ancient paintings had long been lost, and he had traveled all over Jiangnan in search of what remained. These two young people carried cultural traditions on the verge of extinction. They spent their days bickering and joking, while struggling with all their might against the tide of the times to preserve one last wisp of ink smoke before it went out. Theme: Preserve traditional culture with a craftsperson's dedication, and carry its intangible heritage forward through changing times.