Lion Dance

Ⅲ-5Traditional DanceGongyi, HenanBatch 2 (2008)Extension Item

01 · Historical Records

According to records, the Xiaoxiang lion dance began to be performed in the late Ming dynasty and reached its peak in the Jiaqing era of the Qing dynasty, when its reputation rose suddenly.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

Lion dance, also called “shizi wu” (lion dance), “shi deng” (lion lantern), “wu shi” or “wu shizi”, is an important component of the traditional Chinese hundred-performances and acrobatics repertoire. Lion dance has a long history. It is widely popular in the Han areas of China and appears frequently in festival celebrations such as the Spring Festival, using lively and cheerful performance to express the Chinese people's good wishes for auspiciousness and the warding off of disaster. It is generally divided into two major types, the southern lion and the northern lion. The southern lion is agile and fierce and often performs high-difficulty techniques; the northern lion is playful and naive and usually performs teasing and frolicking movements. Xiaoxiang Village, Gongyi City, Henan Province, lies at the “taiji point” where the Yiluo River meets the Yellow River. It belongs to the central Heluo cultural zone and possesses a rich accumulation of traditional culture. The Xiaoxiang lion dance is a traditional dance programme transmitted in Xiaoxiang Village. The Xiaoxiang lion dance is divided into the civil lion (ground platform, tables), the martial lion (high platform) and the group lion (pillar reaching to the sky). Its performance is free and open-handed, steady and delicate, and carries certain narrative content. It can both use mischievous and humorous movements to represent the supreme state in which human beings and animals live together in harmony, and use bold, rugged, vigorous and powerful dance postures to represent the lion's mighty and brave temperament and its agile and nimble expression. The lion leader is often played by a martial monk, who during the performance holds an embroidered ball, walks upside down, and teases and draws the lion with special feats such as somersaulting, leaping, soaring, vaulting, striking, fighting, pouncing and lying down, achieving excellent artistic effect. The Xiaoxiang lion dance is a representative of lion dance in the Central Plains. In promoting fine national traditional culture, strengthening national confidence and cohesion, and safeguarding national unity and social stability, it plays an irreplaceable and important role. Government departments concerned should take positive and effective measures to help this precious folk art enter the path of development and revitalization as quickly as possible. During the performance [the lion leader] holds an embroidered ball, walks upside down, and teases the lion with special feats such as somersaulting, leaping, soaring, vaulting, striking, fighting, pouncing and lying down, achieving excellent artistic effect.

Civil lion on ground platform and tables

One of the three forms of Xiaoxiang lion dance, danced on ground platform and tables with generous yet delicate movement and a simple plot.

Martial lion on high platform

Its high-altitude form, its bold and forceful postures conveying the lion's ferocity and agility, famed for height, difficulty, danger and strangeness.

The pride and the sky-pillaring pole

Its collective form, represented by the sky-pillaring pole, in which many lions climb and stack together, expanding solo technique into group composition.

The teaser's martial tricks

The teaser, usually a martial monk, holds the embroidered ball and walks on his hands, teasing the lion with rolls, leaps, vaults, feints, pounces and drops.

Tail kicking and the double jump

Signature feats of the inheritor Li Jintu, whose高空 style was formed by twenty-six and is noted for height, difficulty, danger and wit.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

The forms of lion dance differ from place to place across China, and their regional characteristics are very distinct.

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04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

In recent years the highly skilled artists within the Xiaoxiang lion dance team have aged: only two of the old artists are over seventy, and only twenty artists are over forty. Together with the shortage of funding and the serious damage to props, these factors have greatly affected the normal running of Xiaoxiang lion dance activities. Li Jintu (official archival record of the associated inheritor): Male, Han ethnicity, born in January 1958, native of Gongyi City, Henan Province. In 1971 he became a disciple of Cui Xijin to learn the ground-platform routines of lion dance, and in 1977 became a disciple of Yang Xixuan to learn the high-platform and aerial routines of Xiaoxiang lion dance; in 2002 he became head of the Gongyi City Xiaoxiang Lion Dance Art Troupe. By the age of twenty-six he had already formed his own personal style of aerial lion dance technique. His performance is famed for being “high, difficult, perilous and wondrous”; techniques such as the lion's tail kicking into the air and the double leap onto a single support are admiration-inspiring. His movements are mischievous and humorous, his performance natural and open, and he fully brings out the might and agility of the lion. He frequently leads the lion dance troupe into communities, schools, homes for the elderly and revolutionary old areas to give慰问 performances, and teaches the art free of charge. Representative inheritor of the fourth batch national-level intangible cultural heritage project Lion Dance (Xiaoxiang Lion Dance). In 2008 he won first prize in the opening performance of the tenth Asian Culture and Arts Festival hosted by the Ministry of Culture and the People's Government of Henan Province.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗

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