Cui Ping Li Xu Cuo Introduction
Located in an alley on Cuiping Road, the residence of Xu's family is the ancestral home of Xu Quanheng, the late secretary-general of the Daxi community agricultural association. It was built around the 43rd year of the Meiji era (1910), featuring a two-story brick building with a one-long dragon and three openings on the facade. The second-floor balcony has green-glazed vase-shaped railings and both the first and second floors are adorned with colorful tiles of various patterns on the walls and railings. The architecture showcases decorative elements commonly found in traditional buildings, such as sculptures of the Eight Immortals and stories of the Twenty-Four Filial Exemplars depicted in Tran ceramic art, as well as painted scroll frames. Notably, the building features rare brick carvings that include figures and auspicious patterns. These carvings and the Tran ceramics and painted scroll frames are the works of the national treasure-level shadow puppet artist Zhang Jiao, the father of Zhang Decheng. Known as "Han Fan," Zhang Jiao was versatile and not only a leader in the shadow puppet theater at that time but also renowned locally for his calligraphy, ceramic art, wood carving, brick carving, and Tran pottery. Many buildings of affluent families in the former Daxi Township (later renamed Daxi Community after the city-county merger) displayed Zhang Jiao's works, unfortunately, most of these have been demolished and rebuilt and are no longer visible today.
