Mansour Mohamad visits the studio of paper-cutting artist Zhang Ning in the county of Fushan. [Photo by Li Shu for China Daily]

A small piece of paper-cut is one of the greatest embodiments of Chinese culture. That's what foreign student Mansour Mohamad recognized after he visited a renowned paper-cutting artist in Shanxi during the recent Spring Festival.

Mansour from Syria is a postgraduate student in Taiyuan University of Technology based in the Shanxi provincial capital of Taiyuan. He planned a visit to Zhang Ning, an inheritor of the intangible cultural heritage of paper-cutting, in the county of Fushan during the Lunar New Year holiday, trying to learn about the history and culture relating to the art and to learn to do the craft himself.

When talking about the culture of paper-cutting, Zhang told Mansour that the centuries-old art has always been associated with traditional Chinese festivals.

"That's why we usually use auspicious colors and patterns to make paper-cuts," Zhang said.

He further explained that red paper is the most favored for paper-cutting as the color symbolizes prosperity and vitality in Chinese culture.

Mansour also learned some basic paper-cutting skills from Zhang. His first piece of work is the god of fortune, which he said he would put on the wall of his dormitory.

"That would ensure me a year of good fortune," he said.

Zhang is a paper-cutting artist with a province-wide reputation. Many of his works have won awards in Shanxi and have been acquired by private collectors and museums like the Shanxi Museum of Fine Arts.

He told Mansour that the secret behind a successful paper-cutter is persistent enthusiasm.

"Before I became a professional artist, I devoted almost all my spare time to this art," Zhang said. "I would drew various patterns and cut them when I was free."

He also told his guest the history of the art, saying that it can be traced back to the prehistorical period. It reached its first peak during the Tang (618-907) and Song (960-1279) dynasties where it was frequently mentioned in poems and other literature of those periods.

The county of Fushan is known for its paper-cutting art throughout the country. It was recognized as "the hometown of paper-cutting" in 2006 by the then Ministry of Culture. Fushan's paper-cutting art was included on Shanxi's provincial list of intangible cultural heritage items in 2009.

Li Shu contributed to this story.