What is Chinese shadow play?
Chinese shadow puppetry is a form of theatre acted by colourful silhouette figures made from leather or paper, accompanied by music and singing. Manipulated by puppeteers using rods, the figures create the illusion of moving images on a translucent cloth screen illuminated from behind.
What forms of shadow puppets is found in China?
The props used in Chinese shadow puppetry are mainly made from animal skins, cow, donkey, goat, horse, mule, etc. The animal skins are pressed, engraved, and dyed to form the shape of human characters, birds and beasts, and background objects.
What do you call the type of shadow play?
Shadow puppetry — also called shadow play — got its start thousands of years ago in China and India. This unique form of storytelling is the oldest type of puppetry in the world. Shadow puppets are figures that are placed between a light and a screen.
What country is shadow puppetry?
shadow play, type of theatrical entertainment performed with puppets, probably originating in China and on the Indonesian islands of Java and Bali. Flat images are manipulated by the puppeteers between a bright light and a translucent screen, on the other side of which sits the audience.
Who invented shadow puppet?
Shadow Puppetry is said to have originated in China over two thousand years ago during the Han Dynasty. The most popular origin legend tells of Emperor Han Wudi who was rendered irrevocably heartsick at the sudden passing of his favorite concubine.
Where is Chinese shadow puppetry performed?
Shadow play is an old tradition and it has a long history in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Cambodia. It has been an ancient art and a living folk tradition in China, India, Iran and Nepal.
What is Chinese shadow puppetry called?
Chinese shadow puppet vocabulary:
| Hànzì | Definition | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | 皮影戏 | shadow play |
| 2. | 传说 | legend |
| 3. | 龙 | dragon |
| 4. | 木偶 | puppet |
How did Chinese shadow puppetry start?
The roots of shadow puppetry in China can be traced back to the early Han Dynasty, where the practice served as a form of entertainment reserved only for nobility. During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, shadow puppetry began spreading to the working class where it was embraced as a people’s folk art.
Who created shadow theater?
Who is considered as a puppet master in shadow puppet plays?
The dalang
The dalang, the puppet master, squatted on bended knees in front of the huge sheet-like screen, illuminated by a hanging bulb. He is the key to all shadow play — the music conductor, the epic storyteller, the comic, philosopher and political pundit.
When was shadow puppetry invented in China?
1st millennium BCE
Shadow puppet theatre likely originated in Central Asia-China or in India in the 1st millennium BCE. By at least around 200 BCE, the figures on cloth seem to have been replaced with puppetry in Indian tholu bommalata shows.
When Did Chinese shadow puppetry originate?
two thousand years ago
Shadow Puppetry is said to have originated in China over two thousand years ago during the Han Dynasty. The most popular origin legend tells of Emperor Han Wudi who was rendered irrevocably heartsick at the sudden passing of his favorite concubine.