Zhou Jinglu/Shanghai Daily news

One of five bamboo carving craftsmen in Jiading District, Jiang Yuming, has worked in the industry for the past 17 years and made hundreds of pieces, including some award-winning works.
Jiang Yuming's house is located on the district's Dongbao Road in Malu Town. Upon entering the house, a display case with more than 20 bamboo carvings of different sizes is immediately visible.
"Because of the care exacted when working, bamboo carving can help you lose weight just like playing qigong," the tall, thin man joked. "The reason I'm so interested in bamboo carving is because I like calligraphy, which I did quite a lot of during my childhood."
In 1988, Jiang was given the opportunity to learn the art of carving while he was teaching Chinese at Malu Middle School. After one year of studying, he developed quite a knack for it.
At that time, he met his wife, Su Yurong, who was also interested in carving traditional patterns on bamboo. They got married in 1995 and have an eight year old daughter now.
In 1998, he resigned his job as a teacher and devoted himself entirely to bamboo carving. He buys bamboo in Shaoxing and Anji - areas of Zhejiang Province that are famous for their expansive bamboo forests.
"Choosing the bamboo is an important job. It should be big and smooth in order to be suitable for carving. Most of the bamboo lengths have a diameter of around 30 centimeters," he said.
Once he gets it home, he boils the bamboo in water for several hours before sun drying it for almost a week to make sure there is no moisture left in it.
Jiang said that most of the works took him several days to carve, and some of the bigger ones took between one month to nearly half a year.
One of his works carving scenes from the beginning of The Diamond Sutra (an ancient Buddhist text) took him more than five months to complete. This carving was awarded first prize at the China Shanghai International Arts Festival in 2003. There are nearly 300 Chinese characters on it, each one about the size of a grain of rice.
Many of his works are popular with businessmen from various countries and regions, such as Taiwan, Hong Kong and Japan, who purchase them for their collections or as gifts.
Carvings of traditional patterns such as the Bodhisattva, lotus flowers and leaves made by his wife, are also well sold.
Jiang spends eight hours a day carving and said he enjoys his work very much.
His daughter also likes drawing and writing, and has developed an interest in carving under the influence of her parents.
"Jiading's bamboo carving is becoming more and more famous in Shanghai and across China, because of our local government's work to promote it. We are encouraged to share this work with the next generation. My carving studio will be open at the beginning of next year and I hope it will give many more people a chance to enjoy and understand the art of bamboo carving," Jiang said.