Light and Shadows

                                                          Last night I attended the Light and Shadows show at Sun Yat Sen Garden, part of Chinatown's festivities for Chinese New year.  I've always loved puppet shows.  There's something magical about puppets in general, shadow puppets especially.  I liked that it was in colour, although my preference still goes to black and white, colour has a delicate translucence of it's own.
I entered through the side door that leads directly to the Hall of a Thousand Rivers.  On the door a sign said to knock and someone would open.  I have to say I loved the touch of the forbidden evoked.  Inside the stage was set:

All in red to welcome in the Chinese New Year.  Each table was set with red cloth, and small gifts for the guests including the traditional red envelope.  Red lanterns hung from the ceiling the stage framed in red velvet.  As the guests arrived they took their places, introducing themselves to the rest of the table of guests.  

 Behind the screen last minute preparations proceeded with peels of laughter and the shuffling of things and positions.  They are one of numerous puppetry troupes in China.  The Beijing Puppet show is at least 600 years old and represents  Beijing specifically, other regions of China have their own representing troupes.  There's lots of interest in China in this traditional art form.  Mr. Lu the master puppeteer is a fifth generation puppeteer, and his troupe have from 4 to 35 years of experience in puppeteering.

 

Our first show was a musical selection of the Tortoise and the Crane.  Pure magic in the softness of the colours, in the gentleness of the movements in the antics of crane and tortoise.  Followed by the Two Friends, a musical pantomime of friendship between a monkey and a panda.   The main event was an excerpt from Journey to theWest, featuring the transformation of the main character from demon to beautiful damsel.  Drums with their deep hollow, cymbals with their characteristic sharpness, and colour, delicate and translucent add to the voice of the storyteller. 

To perform the magic each character is manipulated by at least three puppeteers who have made the puppets, been a part of the entire process and have presented the show at the very least a hundred time a year. Each puppeteer has a repertory of an impressive 60 stories or more.

After the show, as a special treat, we were invited to make our own shadow puppet, completing the experience as each of us got to handle the cow hide pieces and paint them.  We were given help in putting them together though, otherwise some of us would still be there struggling with the needles and thread, looking for the tiny holes and perhaps ending up with some rather of oddly constructed puppets.

Here is my little fox, ready to walk me home.