90-year-old man makes paper cutouts of 4,000-plus butterflies

Photo shows a piece of the paper-cutting work produced by Dong Guodong. (Photo/Chinanews.com)

Dong Guodong, a 90-year-old man in Leqing city, east China’s Zhejiang province, has made paper cutouts of more than 4,000 different butterflies in his leisure time over the past eight years.

With the scissors moving deftly in his hand, Dong now is able to make a paper cutout of a butterfly within five minutes.

What is even more impressive about the nonagenarian is that he made his paper cutouts from recycled paper, including fly sheets, newspapers, wrapping paper, and red envelopes with patterns and greetings, instead of traditional red paper.

“I live a thrifty life. So I take no pleasure in buying sheets of red paper to create paper cutouts,” Dong said.

Dong began to learn paper-cutting skills when he was 82 years old in order to enrich his life in his twilight years. He has a thing for butterflies, and his first piece of paper-cutting work was themed on the insect.

To him, being patient and keeping attentive are vital for completing paper-cutting tasks. In the initial stage, Dong could only make some simple paper cutouts of a butterfly. With his skills improving over time, he came up with innovative designs for paper cutting and developed his own style.

For example, he once created a vivid paper cutout of a butterfly, with four leaves as the insect’s wings and with patterns he cut from a sheet of paper as its head, antennae and body.

“Paper-cutting is my hobby and has become part of my everyday life. It makes me happy, so it doesn’t matter whether I can create even more delicate paper-cuts,” he said.