A Vow to Pass On Traditions, Even in Old Age:
A Nationally Double-Awarded Living Treasure Performing Artist
Today, Chen Xihuang is a 91-year-old nationally-acclaimed performing artist. His father, Li Tianlu, was a renowned master of Taipei's I Wan Jan Puppet(poo-te-hi) Theater. Chen Xihuang’s grandfather was Chen A-Lai, leader of the Lehuayuan ("Garden of Happiness") puppetry troupe. Being born into a family of glove-puppetry performers thus shaped Chen Xihuang's performing career. Chen Xihuang was born in 1931. Because his father Li Tianlu married into the Chen family, according to the agreement, the eldest son must adopt his mother's surname. This is why, unlike most sons in Taiwan who carry their father's surname, Chen has a different surname from his father. It was also in 1931 that Li Tianlu established the I Wan Jan ("A Perfect Likeness") Puppet Theater. Twenty years later, in 1953, Chen Xihuang became a performing master in his own right and established the independent Xinwanran ("A New Likeness") puppetry troupe to tour the greater Taipei area. His skills both onstage and behind the scenes were exemplary, which earned him a good reputation. In 1975, owing to a general decline in the environment for puppetry, Xinwanran was disbanded. In 2009, the Chen Xihuang Traditional Puppetry Troupe was formed again, and has continued to perform to the present. Chen is the only traditional glove puppetry performer in Taiwan to be awarded both Ministry of Culture national titles, “Preserver of Important Traditional Puppetry” and “Preserver of Prop Production Technologies for Classic Puppetry Clothes, Helmets, and Hats.” His major works include Flying Sword and Paladin and Marriage By Chance among others.
In the 1940s, glove-puppet shows were very popular, and the I Wan Jan Puppet Theater, established by Chen’s father Li Tianlu, rose to fame rapidly. Young Chen observed his father to learn how to perform. Later, he spent some time in central and southern Taiwan, where he learned different performing techniques from Zhong Renxiang of the Hsin Hsing Ku Puppet Show Troupe. Chen thus learned the unique performing styles of both the north and the south, from which he developed his own performing style. To perform on TV, after the 1950s Chen Xihuang began to study more delicate puppet manipulation techniques. However, the highly-produced Golden Light puppetry was becoming the mainstream, and traditional puppetry was gradually declining. Although some scholars paid attention to traditional puppetry, the market gradually shrank. Chen had no choice but to disband the Xinwanran troupe.
Later, Chen Xihuang started a world tour of creative puppet show. In coming in contact with the world, he finally realized that he was a world-class puppet master, and the traditional puppetry skills he possesses needed to be preserved and passed down to younger generations. In 2008, at nearly 80 years of age, Chen once more took up the heavy task of promoting traditional culture, and established the Chen Xihuang Traditional Puppetry Troupe. The troupe went on an international tour. To anyone interested in learning puppetry — whether a young person with no foundation in the field, or a foreigner who doesn't even know the Taiwanese (Hoklo) language — Chen is willing to impart his knowledge and skills. His teaching includes onstage puppet manipulation, backstage wind instrument music, costume production, and more. He keeps no secrets.
Chen Xihuang interprets puppetry roles with consummate skill. With adroit hand movements, every character he performs seems to come alive with. Chen also specializes in the production of puppet helmets, weapons, props, and other arts. He makes puppets' clothes and the sewing patterns for them all by himself. The three-dimensional hats he makes have undergone continuous improvement, so that they will not easily fall off during performances. The color matching of his puppets’ clothes is also elegant and is popular among puppet performers. In recent years, Chen’s crafted works have become popular among art collectors.
Helping the Seden Foundation to Pass On Traditions
In 1985, at the founding ceremony for the Seden Glove Puppetry Foundation, nationally acclaimed performers such as Li Tianlu from I Wan Jan and Xu Wang from Xiaoxiyuan were invited to perform together on same stage. After this event, one of the founders of the Foundation, Professor Chen Jinci from National Taiwan University, invited Li Tianlu to teach at the Seden Foundation. Li agreed and recommended his eldest son, Chen Xihuang, to teach courses, in hopes that the torch of glove puppetry can be handed down, generation to generation.
In the olden days, there were relatively few public entertainment activities in Taiwanese society. In those days when even radio programs were not yet popular, people came to the puppet stage not only to "watch the performance", not just to see the performers' manipulation skills, but also to "listen to the performance". “Our puppet manipulation techniques are all quite deep. For example, in your dialogue, voices, and puppet expression, you have to have chemistry with the audience; dialogue itself is a very deep discipline". Chen emphasizes that having dialogue that can catch the audience’s attention is the key to a successful performance. If a puppet performer doesn't get into their characters' emotions, but only recites what's in the script — or if the performer's voices don't hit on what the audience wants — then the performer will only be able to continue as an assistant, and will be unable to become a master performer. “In addition, it is important to distinguish puppets’ different characteristics: How this character needs to walk, how they need to talk… these are all very deep disciplines. Puppets’ movements have to be vivid; only then will the audience like them."
When Chen Xihuang thinks back on the Seden Foundation, he recalls what has impressed him most: at the beginning, the three professors purchased a lot of puppets to support traditional culture of puppetry, which cost them a lot of money. Chen sighs and says that it is really difficult to operate a puppetry troupe. He established the Xinwanran puppetry troupe at the age of 23 when he was young and in high spirits; but in the 1970s, the culture of puppets performed on public stages gradually declined. He often couldn't find people with backstage experience, and had no choice but to disband the troupe. Thus, when he looks back on the rise and fall of the Seden Foundation, he can understand the difficulties the group has had in its operations.
Using the Beauty of the Taiwanese Language to Pass On Puppetry Culture to the Next Generation
Speaking on the rise and fall of glove-puppet show culture, Chen Xihuang recalls that when he was a child, upon hearing the sudden sound of gongs and drums and Beiguan music outside, he would dash out immediately to see the puppet performance, even if he had just picked up a bowl and chopsticks to eat. He always had to hear the opening chords of the performance. He laments that children nowadays do not understand the Taiwanese (Hoklo) language and cannot appreciate the art of the dialogue in Taiwanese.
“Our Taiwanese language is the most beautiful language in the world. Glove puppetry has to have Taiwanese language!”
Introduced by his father Li Tianlu, Chen Xihuang and his younger brother Li Chuancan went to an elementary school to teach. At the time, the school had no funds, no puppets, and no gongs and drums. Yet he and his younger brother had no complaints. With their own puppet masters and resources, they devoted themselves to teaching for more than three years. Yet sadly, the local language environment is also facing a generational crisis. Chen Xihuang is worried that the loss of Taiwanese language and culture will cause traditional puppet culture to disappear along with it. In an environment where children do not understand the spoken Taiwanese language, and even have no interest in traditional puppetry, there will be no new generations writing scripts in Taiwanese, much less pouring out their hearts to study how puppetry is performed through Taiwanese language.
Because of this, when Chen was 79 years old, he came back to establish the Chen Xihuang Traditional Puppetry Troupe. He was reluctant to let this fine traditional culture gradually disappear. “As I see it, if glove puppetry is going to go away, if this aspect of culture disappears, that would really be a pity. This is why I started to work again in my retirement years, at the age of 79. I try my best to teach young generations who want to learn puppetry. That is what got me started again.” Over the past few decades, Chen has witnessed the gradual disappearance of puppetry arts, and gained a deep sense of how difficult it is to preserve traditional culture. He has devoted himself to teaching workshops, with the principle that he will teach anyone who is willing to learn. Chen even teaches his unique techniques, keeping none of them secret. He decides what to teach and how to get children interested in puppetry based on their ages. Children can start with playing with puppets in whatever ways they like. With their bigger palms and better command of puppets’ movements, he teaches middle-school students more about how to control puppets and the skills of spoken Taiwanese-language dialogue.
Chen believes that if puppets become just museum displays, puppetry as a form of traditional culture will eventually disappear. The vitality of puppetry culture must be shown on the public stage, and puppet performances need audiences to watch and listen to them — only in this way can tradition truly be passed on. The craft and techniques of puppet theater need to transformation for a new era, too, by adding new cultural elements. As a puppet master who is renowned as a "master of all trades", even though he's now 90 years old, is always thinking about how to make the glorious art of puppetry perpetuate eternally. Thus, the famous saying goes, “Before one has passed on what one knows, vow to grow old but never rest”.
For Chen Xihuang, the philosophy and operation of the Seden Foundation provide an example of how to pass down experience. He sincerely hopes that government agencies and enterprise will make efforts together to sow the seeds for education in traditional culture.