Shaanxi Folk Art hua county Shadow Play Shehuo

Shaanxi is one of the important birthplaces of Chinese nation and culture, and many traditional arts are still circulating today. So, do you know about hua county Shadow Play and Shehuo, one of the representative folk arts in Shaanxi? Next, let's take a look at the national culture of this issue!

Shaanxi folk art

Hua county shadow play

Shadow play, also known as light and shadow, is named after the figures carved from animal skins are performed by bright cloth under the illumination of lights. It is one of the puppet shows widely circulated among the people in China. Shadow play was originally a palace play, which spread among the people after the Tang Dynasty. Shaanxi is one of the cradles of shadow play. Hua county Shadow Play is the representative of Shaanxi East Road Shadow Play, which is quite famous in China.

Shadow play in Huaxian County has a history of over 1000 years, which has been passed down for thousands of years. It is unique in China's puppet show. It originated in the Han Dynasty and flourished in the Tang, Song and Qing Dynasties. There were twenty or thirty song clubs in the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, and as many as 48 in the 1930s. After the 1970s, there were still 17 shadow puppetry artists, including hundreds of them, including Pan Jingle, Hao, Wei, (sculpture) and Wei Zhiquan (sculpture).

Hua county's shadow play is made of the finest cowhide, which has been carefully produced through more than 20 processes such as scraping, grinding, engraving, dyeing, ironing and decorating. The shape of the shadow play is small and exquisite, with a height of about 35 cm. The carving method is mainly hollow, combined with the traditional line drawing method, such as ten thousand words, fish scales, star eyes, plum blossoms and pine needles. Its coloring adopts the traditional meticulous painting method, which is a rare artistic treasure, not only for performance, but also for collection.

Shehuo

In short, social fire produces primitive and spontaneous religious beliefs. Think flattering because of worship, fake singing and dancing to pray. Folk songs and dances are the main forms of expression.

The specific meaning of social fire refers to folk songs and dances with kitsch nature during the Spring Festival. Sacrificing to social gods and singing and dancing is the oldest custom in China. China has thousands of years of tradition and history.

The social fire we are talking about now generally refers to all kinds of miscellaneous ways of playing the old game of meeting God. "Society" is the god of the land, and "fire" can drive away difficulties and ward off evil spirits. "Shehuo" is a folk activity between villages, and there are sacrifices, invitations and socializations between communities. During a specific period (from the first day to the fifteenth day of the first lunar month in China), people spontaneously engage in folk customs. It is the export of national feelings and the display of wisdom and vitality. It is intended to pray for good weather, abundant crops, peace and prosperity for the country and the people, and all the best.

There are many kinds of social fires, including three-eye guns, flag battles, gongs and drums, stilts, scratching poles, yangko and various folk dances. All kinds of gongs and drums in the social fire show are quite distinctive, among which the spectacular ones are Dali's hundred-sided gongs and drums, drums, scratching poles and straight poles. Hundreds of gongs and drums spread in Hancheng, Heyang and other places, often in front of social fire teams, commonly known as the organ.

During the performance, a total of 120 people participated, with an old drum in the center and a small drum on all sides, with 40 gongs and 40 cymbals on the left and right. The two men held a rocking board to conduct the performance, and the gongs and drums rang with great momentum, clear rhythm and dozens of miles. The scene was magnificent, and the masses made up a formula to praise "a hundred gongs, with the drums;" The cymbals are separated and the hands are full; Looking at the flowers and counting the drums; Look at the momentum, like a tiger. " The scorpion is an instrument for offering sacrifices to the gods by social fire. According to legend, after the Yuan Dynasty destroyed the gold, the army and the people enjoyed it together, and it was later regarded as a drum music to worship the French king by later generations.

In the early performances, the drummers all wore steeple-sloping red tassels, yellow jackets, white cloth skirts around their waists and combat boots. When they beat drums, they stood on their backs and squatted between their hips to beat drums, which was quite Mongolian chivalry. In addition to drums, gongs and cymbals, there is also a horn with traces of ancient military music (namely conch), and its music scores include tiger grinding, nailing and stomachache. The wand is the colorful pole of the social fire gongs and drums team. The performer is dressed in women's clothes (dressed as a woman in the early days, and later dressed as a fashionable girl), holding a 4m-long wand decorated with colorful silk bouquets and a string of silver bells (some of which are also equipped with mirrors or printed towels, quilts, etc.). ), swinging all over, stepping on their legs rhythmically, playing gongs and drums and dancing in the air.

The vertical pole is a sacrificial performance in the social fire team. Its performers are young men, wearing makeup, holding bamboo poles more than 3 meters long, moving on both sides of the social fire team and doing some movements in the air. One-shot sedan chair is a variety in social fire. During the performance, two strong young people wore makeup and carried a wooden pole on their shoulders. There is a clown in a funny costume on the post. When the social fire team is marching, it constantly does handstands and uprights on the pole, which also has the function of driving away people who hinder the progress of the social fire team. Actors dressed as clowns are generally quick-thinking, eloquent and have the ability to improvise.

When the two teams play against each other, they often talk about poetry and prose, mostly local true stories and stories. The two sides expose each other's shortcomings, some are interesting things in the other village, some accuse the bad guys of bad things and their children are unfilial. Today, poetry has also added the content of praising the new style of civilization, which is both humorous and instructive. During the period of 1984, various counties in the jurisdiction held folk social fire performance competitions, and China Academy of Fine Arts and Shaanxi Academy of Art recorded social fire performances in some counties. After the 1990s, with the popularity of television, large-scale social fire performances gradually decreased.