Having appeared only in recent years, bronze wire painting is a young kind of industrial painting, which is done by first inlaying bronze wire into glass to form a particular design and then spray painting over it. Paintings done with such techniques are imbued with a strong folk flavor, looking a bit pompous yet simple and unsophisticated at the same time. It came into birth as a result of both the rich experience and unique inspiration of Wang Jianhua, the art's creator.

According to Wang, the inspiration of bronze wire painting came by luck. At that time, he recalls, something went wrong with his radio, which he had had for so long that he was reluctant to discard it. He took the radio apart and found the problem in the regulator. Failing to find a right regulator in the shop, he set out to repair it on his own. He opened the regulator and put the bronze wires on to a table behind him. Turning around, he found they had wound up naturally on the table, which he thought was very nice. He was inspired and began to make paintings with bronze wires.

Ever since then, Wang Jianhua has forged an indissoluble bond with bronze wires. However, it is no easy job to replace the traditional line drawing of Chinese painting with bronze wires. First, he had to find something for the bronze wires to stick to. After numerous experiments, he chose organic glass, which is nicely transparent with good binding quality and whose surface is easy for things to be sprayed on.

From a chemical point of view, it is not easy to bind metal and organic glass, and still more difficult to arrange the bronze wires into design patterns according to one's will. After two years of many failures, Wang finally came up with the right way. As the first step, he carved lines on the glass and then carved grooves along the lines. After that, he glued the bronze wires into the grooves. If necessary, heating can be used to ensure that the wires adhere firmly to the glass.

Wang's first work of this kind was "Bronze Wire Painting of Landscapes", the picture of which has since become rusted, but with the bronzes wires still sticking solidly to the glass, showing no signs of falling off. Today, not only the problem of rust have been solved, the making techniques have also become delicate and standardized.
The key of working out a good bronze wire painting lies in the draft drawing. Due to the particularity of bronze wire painting, it is hard to make copies of existing works, which makes the draft drawing extremely difficult. To create an ideal painting, Wang usually starts by drawing a great many sketches, before selecting the one that can best represent his design concept. Then, he will make further and repetitive revisions to the drawing.

Having finished the draft drawing, Wang then sets out to carve grooves on the glass with an iron pen by placing the draft under the glass. Prior to this, the wires have to be processed in a special liquid medicine so that they will not rust. The next step is to place the bronze wires to the grooves, and then meticulously and painstakingly adhere them by glue.

The next important step is color spraying. To do this well, one has to control the thickness of the colors to spray over the right place. The size of a picture determines the type of spray pens to be used. Usually, a small one is used for a small picture. The preparation of pigments also counts, and the smaller the pigment particles, the better for color spraying.

Although strictly speaking, bronze wire paintings are done by replacing the lines of traditional Chinese realistic painting with bronze wires, there is a color limitation. Such paintings cannot be colored in the way they look like in real life because not only will that eliminate the three-dimensional and relivo-like effects of the bronze wire, but also cause additional difficulties to the spraying. Therefore, the colors of bronze wire paintings are not complex at all, as only five colors are used.

Any kind of folk artworks is characterized with a strong local and folk flavor, so is bronze wire painting. Though unique in their making techniques, the paintings invariably embody the environment and experience of the folk artists, whose works are inspired by the many of local customs and morals. The greatest feature of Wang Jianhua' works, as he said himself, is the fact that he draws on many of the traditional aesthetic characteristics of Chinese folk arts, especially from New Year Pictures, and makes innovations on the way of expression in his creation of bronze wire paintings.

The success of bronze wire painting marks a new breakthrough in the world of folk arts. Though still very young, such unique folk customs are bound to gain further development with the enormous efforts of the devoted folk artists.