Yang Fengshan

01 · Lineage & Regional School

In 2000 he was recommended as a master by the Taolinping painted-face shehuo troupe. Within the regional tradition and school record of Minjian Shehuo Performance in Jingxing, Hebei: Folk shehuo is a popular self-entertainment activity performed during the Spring Festival; it originated in the ancient worship of the earth god and the fire god. Later, to commemorate this battle, the local people organised themselves carefully and rehearsed hard, performing publicly in the form of painted-face shehuo, a tradition that has been handed down for more than six hundred years. The performers of Taolinping shehuo possess outstanding martial skill. During the Jiajing reign of the Ming dynasty they were appointed by the court as the imperial-standard guard, and so the annual Zhaozhuangling imperial standard of Jingxing has always been escorted by Taolinping shehuo, which is why it is called the "escort-the-standard shehuo."

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Male, Han, born in March 1964, a native of Jingxing County, Hebei Province. At the age of six he began learning shehuo from the veteran artist Su Laixi. At ten he performed formally with the shehuo troupe in his own village and in neighbouring villages. Because of his fine performing skills he was repeatedly rated an outstanding performer. Building on the shehuo skills of the veteran artists Zhao Mingcheng, Zhao Xian, Zhao Ruyun and Su Laixi, he trained assiduously and gained a comprehensive command of the painted-face makeup designs and martial routines of painted-face shehuo, and introduced innovations of his own. Together with Zhao Xiwen he also passed all these skills on to the next generation. Within the documented technical tradition of Minjian Shehuo Performance in Jingxing, Hebei: "She" refers to the god of the earth; "huo" is the ancestral founder of fire, the legendary fire god. Historically a country founded on agriculture, China used its land for cultivation and its fire for cooking food and keeping warm; both were the material basis of people's survival and development. In antiquity, primitive thinking led people to believe that fire too had a "spirit," and they came to worship it as a divine object of special significance, thus forming the idea of venerating fire. From the ancient worship of the earth god and the fire god grew the custom of sacrificing to she and huo. As society developed and people's understanding deepened, elements of entertainment were gradually added to these sacrificial rites, which in the end developed into a folk entertainment activity of great scale and rich content. By performance form, shehuo falls into two categories: tableau shehuo and performance shehuo. Tableau shehuo includes the procession forms of cloth shehuo, back-carried shehuo, horse shehuo, cart shehuo, core-frame shehuo, mountain shehuo and mask shehuo, which mainly display character modelling and craftsmanship; performance shehuo includes ground-platform shehuo and stilt shehuo, which mainly stage combat performances in courtyards. Shehuo draws on folk legends and dramatic stories for its themes; one or a group of figures presents one story, and one story constitutes one "turn" of shehuo. The performers paint shehuo facial make-up, wear shehuo costumes and carry shehuo staffs. In a shehuo procession a scout on horseback goes first, followed by the shehuo association banner, the firearm (cannon) squad, the flag squad and the shehuo troupe, with the gong-and-drum band bringing up the rear. Reform and opening up brought new vitality to the art of folk shehuo; under the new conditions the traditional art has been carried forward and has become a folk cultural activity that the masses greatly enjoy. Painted-face shehuo is a folk performance held every year on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month in Taolinping Village, Xiaozuo Town, Jingxing County, Hebei Province. Legend has it that more than eight hundred years ago a fierce battle was fought in Jingxing County, in which several generals fought bloody engagements and defeated the invaders. Taolinping painted-face shehuo presents battle scenes from stories such as those of the Three Kingdoms and Liangshan, in sixteen turns; each turn tells one story. The first fifteen turns depict the battles of famous generals of past ages, while the sixteenth was created by Zhao Weihai, an old artist of Taolinping Village. Taolinping painted-face shehuo involves no singing and no speech; the identity of the characters and the content of the story can only be distinguished by careful observation of the performers' facial shapes and movement patterns. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "The sixteen turns of the painted-face show": Sixteen turns enact battle scenes from the Three Kingdoms and Liangshan tales; the sixteenth was created locally by the old artist Zhao Weihai. "A show without song or speech": With no singing or narration, identities are read purely from face shapes, moves and formations. "The fifteenth-day performance": Once each year on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the troupe marches village to village in a fixed order. "The old escort of the imperial standard": The troupe was once made escort of the imperial standard in the Jiajing era and thereafter annually escorted it, earning its present title.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

National representative bearer of the Folk Shehuo Performance (Taolinping Painted-Face Shehuo), a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project. He holds and takes part in painted-face shehuo activities every year and has repeatedly received awards from cultural departments at various levels.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage

National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Yang Fengshan · National Representative Bearer Archive