Do-it-yourself
"The way Wang Kuo-tsai uses scientific methods to study paper is the most fascinating thing about him," says Hou Chi-liang, who became good friends with Wang after meeting him in his search for art paper. Wang took his first degree in forestry, and received a full and rigorous scientific training. Furthermore, out of his own interest, for many years he has been collecting all kinds of art paper, exchanging opinions with painters and calligraphers, and exchanging technological knowledge with overseas researchers and with his colleagues at the TFRI. Thus his mastery of the science of paper production is something few can match. "That's why he can easily convert the ancient techniques and correctly translate them into modern materials, and go on to make improvements with regard to all kinds of problems in terms of concepts, techniques and materials that the ancients were unable to resolve, and make new breakthroughs in papermaking techniques," says Hou.
We asked Wang Kuo-tsai himself why he is able to make such paper. Is it because of his specialist background?
"There are plenty of people with a stronger scientific background than I have, but perhaps others are not so willing to get off their high horse, roll up their sleeves, and actually do things themselves," says Wang, who was born on Matsu, where from early childhood his three meals a day, snacks and fruit were all sweet potatoes. For example, to prepare the pulp for papermaking, he has to use a pestle to beat the bark of the paper-mulberry tree (Broussonetia papyrifera) by hand, because the bark fibers are long, and if one uses a machine they get tangled. But this beating with the pestle takes a whole day. In the past, before air-conditioning was installed in the lab, when he heated the pulp with a gas burner, he would be drenched with sweat. He does not have a tough constitution, and after finishing a batch of paper he would be sure to fall ill.
"There are also many variables in the actual procedure, which you have to study and resolve one by one," says Wang. When he was first making ciqing paper, he thought he had ironed out all the problems in the lab, but to his surprise in the papermaking workshop, as soon as the pulp beating machine started up, a big patch of bubbles appeared which were which were pulled down into the pulp with a gurgling noise, and he had to rush to turn the machine off. This happened five or six times in a row. After thinking about it for long time, he realized that the cause of the trouble was that the pulp contained substances with surfactant properties, and the rapidly rotating blades of the beater were carrying a great deal of air into the pulp. He spent two months working on the problem, which he finally resolved by adjusting the order in which ingredients were added.
Literature may be passed down forever, but paper can only survive for a limited time. How to extend paper's life is a topic of great interest to modern papermaking experts. (courtesy of the National Palace Museum)