Paper-cut Art - Beijing Opera Mask

The development of facial arts is inseparable from the development of Chinese operas. Around the 12th and 13th centuries of the performance of Song Yuanyuan and Yuan Zaju, there appeared a large white-faced harlequin mask in the center of the face. Net Angle Facebook Legend has it that before the development of Chinese opera, there were “masked songs and dances” in the music and dance programs of the Northern and Southern Dynasties and the Sui and Tang dynasties (AD 420-907). This mask is the originator of Facebook.

The Origin and Development of Facebook

The development of facial arts is inseparable from the development of Chinese operas. Around the 12th and 13th centuries of the performance of Song Yuanyuan and Yuan Zaju, there appeared a large white-faced harlequin mask in the center of the face. Net Angle Facebook Legend has it that before the development of Chinese opera, there were “masked songs and dances” in the music and dance programs of the Northern and Southern Dynasties and the Sui and Tang dynasties (AD 420-907). This mask is the originator of Facebook. According to “Old Tang Book? Musical Records”: “The big side is from the Northern Qi Dynasty. The Northern King Lanling Wang Changgong was a martial artist and faced the United States. He often had a fake face to face the enemy. He attacked Zhou Shijin’s city and won the championship. For this reason, to dance for this purpose, it means that the king of Lan Ling enters the formation." This is the record of Qi Ren performing Lan Ling's king wearing a mask to beat the enemy dance. Until the 1980s, the ancient local opera loved by the Buyi people in the Xingyi area of ​​Guizhou Province in China still had the habit of wearing art masks to perform. This may be regarded as the living fossil in the history of Facebook. However, with the development of Chinese opera art, wearing art masks acting more and more detrimental to the performance of the actor's face, artists use ink, oil paint, pot smoke directly on the face outline, so that gradually produced a face. At that time, the troupe performed mainly with open-air performances, and audiences far from the stage often couldn't see the actor's facial expressions and hooked up with Facebook to make it clear to viewers in the distance.

In order to adapt to open-air performances, the hooked facials generally use three contrasting colors: black, red, and white. They emphasize the features of facial features, skin color, and facial muscles, such as thick eyebrows, big eyes, nostrils, and large beaks. This original facial expression is simple and crude, and gradually becomes more and more decorative with the development of traditional opera art. By the end of the eighteenth century and early nineteenth century, Beijing Opera gradually formed a fairly complete artistic style and performance method. After the Peking opera masks absorbed the advantages of facial expressions of various operas, they continued to explore and research through several generations of famous actors and theatrical artists. Improve, innovate and reform, get full development. The patterns and colors are more and more colorful, and the distinction between various characters has become more and more clear, and many facets of historical and mythical characters have been created, forming a complete makeup spectrum.

Facebook uses certain colors based on a character, temperament, or a particular type of character. The red masks indicate the loyal and loyal volunteers, such as Guan Yu, Qi Wei, Chang Yuchun; the black mask expresses valiant, upright, brave, and even reckless, such as Bao Zheng, Zhang Fei, and Li Wei; the yellow mask expresses viciousness and brutality, such as Yu Wen. Chengdu, Dian Wei. The blue or green face represents a number of rough and fierce characters, such as Douldun and Ma Wu; white masks generally represent treacherous and bad people, such as Cao Cao and Zhao Gao.