On the evening of October 24th, the first performance of the dramaThe Historical Story ofJCUwasput on in the GANI Student Activity Center of Xianghu Campus. With the history of Chinese modern ceramic art education as the main line, the drama tells about Jingdezhen ceramic folklore and traditional ceramic art,shows the modern ceramic industry pioneers' feelingsand their entrepreneurial process－promoting Chinese ceramic culture, revitalizing China's ceramic industry.More than 600 people, representing teachers and students ofJCU, watched the performance.
At the beginning of the show, as the lights dimmed, the story went back to 1910, when China Ceramic School was founded. In the second year of Xuantong in the late Qing Dynasty, Zhang Jian, Xu Fengjun, Zhang Hao and others, with the ambition of saving the country through education and the will to help the world through industry, set up China Ceramic School in Jiangxi Ceramic Industry Company under the background of investment from five provinces in spite of difficulties and carried out great practice and reform.
During its hard development journey, the school has changed its name ten times, its site four times and suspended four times. With all the hardships it has experienced, the school hasn’t changed its original goal. During the time, a batch of scholars including Zou Junzhang, Zou Rugui, Wan Fan who had returned from overseas started their great journey of fighting for a bright future of the school. With "to cultivate talents with theoretical and technical knowledge so as to improve the ceramic industry" as school-running goal, these pioneers began the reform in ceramic education and porcelain-making skills and bid to set up Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute.All those have shown thetouching stories of thepioneers－abandoning preferential treatment abroad, trying to abandon thebad habits inporcelain industry,opening up the ceramic higher educationandspread the ceramic culture to the world.
In the end, the story comes to an end in the high-spirited school song and in the spirit of our ancestors "love our country, love china and love our school". The story is appealing and leaves strong visual and auditory impact on the audiences. History goes into the play, the play tells about history.The touching story, the truth of history, the spirit of craftsmen and the inheritance of culture deeply shocked the hearts of every teacher and student present, and many teachers and students were moved to tears.
In order to thoroughly implement the Implementation Outline of Patriotic Education in the New Era, and give full play to the role of "learning from history and educating people by guiding the government", the teachers and students decided to put on this drama.The script creation of it began in October 2019. It has gone through several stages, including frame conception, story outline, ceramic history material collection, ceramic education history material collection, script writing, plot discussion, expert examination and so on. Due to the long time span, many characters involved and the complex era background,38 actors of JCU began to rehearse intensively since the summer vacation, and finally created this 100-minute drama of school history.
Qi Le, a counselor from the Student Affairs Department, who played the role of Guo Xinwei, said, "Every actor has made a great effort in the rehearsal of the drama. My understanding of this role and the development of JCU hasbeen enriched. In the course of 110 years of development, JCU has been suspended and resumed, which is a very difficult thing for everyone of the school. However, that is exactly the spirit of “sincerity, austerity, forgiveness and perseverance".
Hu Fei, a instructor of the School of Mechanical and Electronic Engineering, who plays Zhang Hao, said: "JCU's 110 years' history is a journey full of ups and downs. JCU, as the only university named after ceramics in China, has achieved today's achievements by everyone's hard-working throughout the journey.
Xu Jianbo, a student from Class 2, Grade 2018ofProduct Design, who plays Wu Renjing in the drama, said: "The process of our performance is also a learning process. I was deeply impressed by the role of Xv Fengjun. At that time, due to the feudal thought, the only way to learn ceramic skills was to be an apprentice. As a teacher, XvFengjun saw many children suffered a lot from that situation, and so he started to change the situation.The China Ceramic School founded by him and Zhang Jian and others was theresult of theconflict and collision between the old society and the new ideas."
It is reported that the dramaThe Historical Story of JCUhas been scheduled to tour in and out of the university from late October 2020. The drama script, costume props and background music are all created by teachers and students independently, which is a bold attempt to create literary works with Jiangxi characteristics.
