Jianhu Acrobatics
01 · Historical Records
Jianhu acrobatics comes from the Qingfeng area in central Jianhu County, Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province. In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, Jianhu already had 18 circus troupes, whose footsteps reached across China and Southeast Asia; by the early Qing, more than two hundred households of local performers made their living from the 'hundred entertainments', among them the Gao, Wan, Wu and other ten great families whose skills were outstanding and whose fame spread far and wide. According to historical records, the 'Eighteen Troupes' acrobatics has been passed down through twelve generations of inheritors up to the present. The performers organized troupes on the basis of families and village troupes, traveling by water to perform for pay abroad, and gradually formed eighteen circus groups centered on Qingfeng.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, the footprints of Jianhu's 18 circus troupes reached across China and Southeast Asia. According to historical records, the 'Eighteen Troupes' acrobatics has already had twelve generations of inheritors; in the early Qing, performers of the 'hundred entertainments' in Jianhu numbered more than two hundred households, among whom the Gao, Wan, Wu and other ten great families had outstanding skills and far-reaching fame. Jianhu 'Eighteen Troupes' acrobatics merges vigorous boldness with gentle beauty, embedding difficult techniques within relaxed, lively, and exquisite movements; drawing on sister arts such as dance and gymnastics, it has formed a unique southern school of acrobatics. 'Paired Bowl Balancing', 'Duo Tightwire', 'Rolling Cups', 'Bowl Kicking on a High Bike', 'Duo Flower-Jar Balancing', 'Dunhuang Poses', 'Face Changing', and 'Spring River, Flowers, and the Moon' are traditional repertoire works of Jianhu acrobatics. At present, how to cultivate a domestic audience and let more people in China understand and come to love it is a problem that Jianhu acrobatics, as an outstanding intangible cultural heritage of the Chinese nation, must face.
The Eighteen Troupes of Qingfeng
The Eighteen Troupes spread across Qingfeng township in central Jianhu county, where eighteen natural villages each formed a circus group.
Double Handstand Bowl-balancing and Two-person Wire
Traditional Jianhu pieces, the first balancing bowls on paired partners' hands, the second a two-person wire act of balance.
Rolling Cups, Bowl-kicking and Double Jar
Traditional items: cups rolled over the body, bowls kicked onto the head from a tall unicycle, and two performers tossing and catching jars.
Dunhuang Poses, Face-changing and Spring River
Items drawing on dance and gymnastics, taking Dunhuang mural poses, opera face-changing and a lyric riverside mood into acrobatic form.
Bu Shuquan and the six-bowl record
Bu Shuquan, on stage from fifteen, set a record of catching six bowls forehand and backhand in Bowl-kicking, and later trained over a hundred pupils.
The southern school's strength and grace
The Eighteen Troupes fuse vigour with grace, setting difficult skills inside light, lively movements to form a distinct southern school.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The 'Eighteen Troupes' of Jianhu acrobatics are distributed in Qingfeng Town, central Jianhu County, Yancheng City, Jiangsu Province. Historically, the eighteen natural villages centered on Qingfeng were laid out in scattered order, forming eighteen circus groups. Jianhu 'Eighteen Troupes' acrobatics serves as a bridge for friendly exchanges between peoples of all countries, a bond for economic and trade cooperation, and an envoy for the spread and exchange of culture and art; it plays a positive role in preserving distinctive local cultural resources and promoting local socioeconomic development.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
In this sense, Jianhu acrobatics urgently needs protection. Bu Shuquan (recorded in the official file of the associated inheritor): Male, Han ethnicity, born in January 1969, from Jianhu County, Jiangsu Province. A national second-class actor of acrobatics. He began performing on stage at the age of 15, constantly summing up and improving his art, and gradually developed his own style and characteristics. His solo act 'Bowl Kicking on a High Bike' once set a historical record by balancing six bowls, both upright and inverted. After retiring from performance and transferring to coaching, he has recruited and trained more than one hundred students in succession. He participated in the creative coaching of the large acrobatic drama 'Monkey: Journey to the West', serving as the designer and instructor of its acrobatic vocabulary. He is a representative inheritor of Jianhu acrobatics, a project in the fourth national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage. The repertoire works he has passed down and created have repeatedly won awards in competitions at the provincial level and above: among them, 'Flying' won the bronze prize at the 6th Moscow International Circus Festival; 'Springboard Shoulder Balancing', which he creatively coached, won the silver prize at the 8th China Acrobatics Golden Chrysanthemum Awards; and the inherited and innovated 'Startling Wind - Rotating Soft Wire' won the bronze prize at the 13th France International Circus Festival and the 10th China Acrobatics Golden Chrysanthemum Prize.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Boshuquan 04-1741
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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