frauke at large

Went to a Sichuan restaurant in Pudong over the weekend and were privilege to one of China’s most mysterious performing arts: ‘face changing’, or Bian Lian.

Unfortunately, the lighting in the restaurant was criminal and so the pictures had to be taken with a flash, losing some of the atmosphere. Adding to the difficulty of taking a decent picture was the speed at which the guy changed the masks, as well as his movement around the room. Nevertheless, I hope that these few images convey a little of what we saw.

 

We must have seen about 20 different masks in all colours of the rainbow, each beautifully painted. I was told that only a handful of face changers exist in China and that its art is only handed down from one face changer to the next – a little like the well kept secrets of magicians in Europe. My guess is that every mask is worn at the start of the show and one by one each is pealed off to reveal the next. Although this might sound like a feasible explanation and therefore gives the impression that pealing off each layer is therefore an easy task, there is absolutely no correlation between my theory and its difficulty or ease, because … consider this: where do the pealed off masks go at such speed? So there is the added complication of making the old one disappear … a sure sign of ninja superpowers.

Anyway, the performance was supported by great food – reminded me a lot of the food I had on my trip to Kunming, only not quite as spicy – they must have held back on the chilli somewhat.