Constructing a New Interactive Visual Narrative of Contemporary Digital Wooden Carving Window Decorations

Traditional Wooden Carving in Quanzhou, China is a National Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICH), which was established in Tang Dynasty (AD 686), and has a history of more than a thousand years. It is a narrative presentation of the life, culture and other daily respects of the people in southern Fujian province. The project focuses on the Wooden Carving Window Decoration in Southern Fujian Ancient Building, by using AI technology to extract features of the landscape, figures and various types of rare, exotic creatures in wooden carvings, their digital 3D models can be generated and presented, a comprehensive database of elements of wooden window carving can also be built. Furthermore, the human–computer interaction is supported by hand gesture recognition technology, allowing participants creatively design their own contemporary digitalized wood window carving. This project expects the interactive and narrative features of the digital wooden window carving model can trigger a deeper sense of identification with the traditional southern Fujian culture among the young generation and erase the distant feeling towards traditional ICH culture spatially and temporally. Moreover, it could also provide a new way of thinking for the innovative inheritance of ICH.