Festivals and Theater Arts in China, Japan, Indonesia and means skin, and refers to the leather construction

construction of the puppets

PEKING OPERA
China is known for their traditional theater art form, the Peking
Opera or Beijing Opera which combines music, vocal performance, are carefully shaped with very fine tools and supported with carefully
pantomime, dance, and acrobatics. shaped buffalo horn handles and control rods.
Roles and Characters:
1.Sheng- is the main male role in Peking opera The stories are usually drawn from the Hindu epics:
*Xiaosheng-actors are often involved with beautiful women 1.Ramayana
*wusheng-martial character 2.Mahabharata
*laosheng-dignified older role 3.Serat Menak - a story about the heroism of Amir Hamza

2. Dan - refers to any female role in Peking opera. Nang Shadow Puppets of Thailand
*laodan-old woman Shadow puppet (Thai: Nang) was one form of public entertainment
*wudan-martial women in the south of Thailand. It is still very popular at village festivals,
*daomadan-young female warriors temple fairs, and celebrations such as marriages. Its characters are
*qingyi-virtuous and elite women made from intricately cut out and articulated shapes of leather.
*huadan-viavcious and unmarried women
Two Types of the Nang:
3.Jing is a painted face male role who plays either primary or 1. Nang Talung is played with leather puppets, each
secondary roles representing a separate character, about 50 centimeters
high. They usually possess a movable, jointed arm
4.Chou- male clown role who plays secondary roles which means controlled by a string.
ugly
2. Nang Yai is normally made of cowhide and rattan, a
large, decorated scenes and characters measuring
Peking-opera performers utilize four main skills.
around two meters high and a meter wide. They do not
1. Song
have jointed arms, but the themes and styles remain the
2. Speech
same.
3. Dance-acting - This includes pure dance, pantomime, and all
types of dance.
Chinese Spring:New Year Festival
4. Combat - includes both acrobatics and fighting with all
Longest and most important festivity in the Chinese
manner of weaponry
calendar.
The meaning of colors in Peking Opera Masks/Make-ups
Dragon dance-form of traditional dance and performance in Chinese
• Red - devotion, courage, bravery, uprightness and loyalty. culture
• Black - roughness and fierceness
• Yellow - fierceness, ambition and cool-headedness Taiko Drum Festival of Japan
Japanese drum festival
• Purple - uprightness, sophistication and cool-headedness
• Reddish purple - just and noble character Balinese Dance Festival of Indonesia
• Blue - loyalty, fierceness and sharpness Very ancient dance tradition that is a part of the religious
and artistic expression among Balinese people
• White - dangerousness, suspiciousness
and craftiness. Commonly seen on the Lantern Festivals of Thailand
stage is the white face for the powerful The launching of lanterns which are actually small hot air
villain balloons.
• Green - impulsive and violent and stubbornness
Loy or Loi Krathong Festival
KABUKI THEATER This takes on the evening of the fullmoon of the 12 th month
Kabuki is a form of traditional Japanese drama with highly stylized in the traditional Thai lunar calendar.
song, mime, and dance, now performed only by male actors.
Japanese, originally as a verb meaning “act dissolutely,’ later Loy/Loi – mens to float
interpreted as: ka – song, bu – dance and ki – art/skill. Kabuki Krathong- lotus shaped receptacle
theater is known for the stylization of its drama and for the elaborate
make-up worn by some of its performers. Kabuki is therefore
sometimes translated as "the art of singing and dancing".
The Kabuki stage features:
• Hanamichi – a flower path, a walkway
which extends into the audience and via
which dramatic entrances and exits are
made; Okuni also perform on a
hanamichi stage with her entourage.
• Kogakudo -kabuki theaters that have
stages both in front of the audience and
along the sides help create a bond
between the actors and viewers
• Mawaro butal -the interior of the theater
contains a revolving stage
• Suppon -a platform that rises from below the
stage
• Hanamicho – a walkway that cuts
through the audience seating area to
connect the stage with the back of
the theater
• Magicians and supernatural beings often
make their entrances from trap doors in
the hanamichi

WAYANG KULIT
Wayang refer to kinds of puppet theaters, sometimes the puppet
itself is referred to as wayang. Performances of shadow puppet
theaters are accompanied by a Gamelan orchestra in Java, and by
Gender Wayang in Bali. Wayang Kulit, or shadow puppets, are
without a doubt the best known of the Indonesian Wayang. Kulit