Supporting Understanding of Tacit Craft Knowledge through Digital Mediation: Evidence from Quyang Stone Sculpture

Craft-based intangible cultural heritage depends on tacit, embodied, and materially situated knowledge that is difficult to communicate through verbal explanation, demonstration, or visual documentation alone. This study examines how digital mediation can support understanding of such knowledge in Quyang Stone Sculpture without replacing embodied craft learning. A qualitative-dominant multi-source design combined semi-structured interviews with three craft inheritors, field observation, and a preliminary questionnaire involving 261 respondents. The analysis identified four themes: preparatory understanding before practice, tacit and judgement-based knowledge, decisions and consequences, and the boundaries of digital mediation. The findings indicate three potential supplementary functions of digital mediation: supporting orientation before practice, facilitating the interpretation of selected relationships underlying craft judgement, and providing opportunities for reflection on decisions and consequences. However, such support remains limited to interpretation and reflection, as digital environments cannot reproduce the full sensory, material, bodily, and interpersonal conditions required for developing craft competence. Digital mediation is therefore best understood as a complementary component of craft learning, while sustained engagement with practitioners, materials, and tools remains essential to embodied skill development.