Source: Zhejiang Daily
On September 23, the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou officially kicked off, and the opening ceremony held at the Hangzhou Olympic Sports Center Stadium just surprised the world.
The whole performance integrates the power of science and technology and the beauty of art, and through high-tech empowerment, inserts wings of imagination into traditional culture, and creates a classic picture with oriental aesthetic charm. The ingenious artistic conception and beautiful and atmospheric performance fully demonstrate the ecological beauty, humanistic beauty and sports beauty of civilized and modern China.
Chao News reporters interviewed Lu Chuan, one of the chief directors of the opening ceremony, exclusively for the first time, and listened to him talk about the highlights behind the opening ceremony.
1] What do you want to say in each of the three chapters?
Tonight's opening ceremony can be described as being carried out in green waters and green mountains, coinciding with the autumnal equinox of the 24th solar term, carrying forward the excellent traditional Chinese culture and displaying the modern civilization of the Chinese nation, which has become an important creative concept throughout the opening ceremony.
The performance is divided into three chapters: "National Style and Elegant Rhyme", "Qiantang Tide" and "Hand in Hand".
The first part of "National Style and Elegant Rhyme" shows the historical part, especially the profound humanistic history of Hangzhou, and its modern aesthetic expression is amazing.
The novella "Qiantang Tide" takes the Qianjiang tide as the main body, and the audience sees the tide of movement, the tide of science and technology, and the tide of brave standing at the head of the tide, and the spirit of the times rolls in.
The next part, "Hand in Hand", fully shows the thriving and future scenes of China and Asia in the new era.
Chao News Reporter: Why is the main tone of the performance set turquoise?
Lu Chuan: The whole creation is divided into three chapters. The previous "National Style and Elegant Rhyme" is mainly expressed from the charm of Hangzhou, and this chapter is inseparable from the natural environment. In the next part, it is not only about Hangzhou, but also about China now, and green waters and green mountains are also very needed.
Chao News Reporter: How did Hangzhou elements fit perfectly into this performance?
Lu Chuan: Hangzhou's regional culture starts from Liangzhu, to West Lake, to the Grand Canal, and the three mascots of Qiang, Lianlian and Chenchen also represent our three major world heritage sites in Hangzhou. People's expectations and expectations for Hangzhou may be different from other cities in China. In the past, some large-scale sports events were basically in Beijing, of course, Guangzhou also had the Asian Games, but everyone's expectations for Hangzhou, I think are still different. At the same time, the world's expectations for today's Hangzhou and today's China are also different. So for us, this era is a good time. In addition, the combination of technology and art is also something that can make everyone refreshing in this era, which turns more imagination into reality.
In the creative process of the opening ceremony, what we insisted on was to use Hangzhou elements to base ourselves on Hangzhou and express Hangzhou. For the selection of Hangzhou elements, it has gone through a relatively long process. Because there are so many things that Hangzhou can express, for example, when we prepare for the opening short film, everyone discusses that we want to shoot the beautiful scenery of Hangzhou, there are forty or fifty on a list, and these beautiful scenery alone can make a film. Speaking of ancient buildings, there are more than a hundred on a list. Hangzhou is indeed a big book, a city with rich historical and cultural accumulation, how to choose Hangzhou elements, the highest efficiency to trigger the audience's emotional resonance, this selection process is what our team needs to consider in particular. Deputy Chief Director Cui Wei has done a lot of work because she grew up here and has a deep understanding of Hangzhou, which has helped us a lot.
There are two ways to design the opening ceremony, you can use international modern vocabulary to do the opening ceremony that has no specific relationship with the city, or you can do the opening ceremony that is closely related to the city's destiny, history and culture, and use a relatively small incision to show the attitude and temperature of the whole China. We chose the latter, expressing Zhejiang and China through Hangzhou.
Chao News Reporter: How did the inspiration and creativity of the Asian family come from?
Lu Chuan: The content of each opening ceremony has a theme. On the one hand, the theme expression is the expression of our main creative team, thinking about how to tell Chinese stories. On the other hand, we also need to consider the needs of the times and make it an art form that conforms to the aesthetics of the public and can ignite everyone's inner emotions. On occasions like the opening ceremony of the Asian Games, we need to express for the country what we most want to say to the world at this time.
2] How was the amazing "tide" designed?
In the middle of the performance, the audience is amazed by the tide rolling on the stage, not only the "trapeze" performance, but also the "cross tide" and "tide tree" and other forms of tide.
Chao News Reporter: Why did you use "water" as the core element throughout the venue this time?
Lu Chuan: All things are aquatic, and Hangzhou is a city full of bridges and water, so this theme was decided very early.
In the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, we will say that it is a cultural symbol of the Yellow River Basin, golden iron horse, strong and powerful; Hangzhou is a water town, which means expressing the unique cultural significance of the water town. But just like "tide", it is not blindly soft, in addition to femininity, I think there is also a sense of power like the Qiantang River tide.
Chao News Reporter: "Chao" is amazing, did the design take a lot of thought?
Lu Chuan: I was very impressed, at a certain creative conference, everyone suddenly talked about the topic of "tide", and said that the tide of the Qiantang River is also divided into cross tides, fish scale tides, etc., which are all things outside my knowledge. Everyone mentioned these tides, talked about the different forms of the Qiantang River tide, we went back and looked it up, and found that it was really spectacular, and then slowly added to the creativity.
Chao News Reporter: How did you get the "tide" to roll on the stage?
Lu Chuan: Now the ground screen technology has been very developed, our floor screen this time has also been updated, technically speaking, this digital tide production is not particularly difficult. The difficulty is still imagination, the presentation on the earth screen, such as the two actors hanging Weiya on the tide, and the athletes chasing the waves. How to combine live performance with video is where imagination is most needed.
3] How does "digital and real fusion" light the cauldron?
At the opening ceremony, the main creative team completed the lighting of the cauldron in the form of "digital and real integration", which became the first digital ignition ceremony in the history of the Asian Games, and realized the participation of all people and the interconnection of data and reality, and the scene was very spectacular.
Chao News Reporter: "The integration of data and reality" lit the main torch to amaze the world, how did it happen?
Lu Chuan: I think the most innovative and technological thing in the entire opening ceremony was the final ignition device. Along with the ignition process, the sculpture moves accordingly, which is a very technological thing.
This idea is thanks to the sculpture's author, Lin Gang, a very famous sculptor in Hangzhou. At that time, many schemes were studied for ignition, and finally Mr. Lin's plan was chosen. It took Mr. Lin a long time to make this set of equipment, and our whole design was correct with Mr. Lin for a long time. I think his installation is very attentive, very good, and worthy of being moved out of the venue and becoming a permanent display in the city for people to see.
Chao News Reporter: The children like the three little Asian Games mascots in the performance.
Lu Chuan: It is very important to be able to let the children insist on watching the opening ceremony. Influencing the next generation is an important goal of all literary and artistic activities, and we look forward to truly influencing the hearts and minds of the next generation. I hope more children will enjoy this opening ceremony.
Chao News Reporter: The music of this performance is also very exciting, is there a lot of innovation?
Lu Chuan: In the music team of the opening ceremony, Zhao Lin is a very outstanding composer of the younger generation and has experience in participating in large-scale national projects. There is also our music director, Mr. Tan Dun, Mr. Tan Dun has been creative with us for more than a year, and some of his ideas are very good and excellent, and they were also presented at the opening ceremony.
Chao News Reporter: As a film director, do you have a useful method of film expression at the opening ceremony?
Lu Chuan: When I created "Bird's Nest Attraction", I made a preliminary attempt to combine the performance method of the ground screen and the dancers, and this Asian Games opening ceremony continued to use the cooperation between the floor screen image and the dancers, which was a big highlight of the opening ceremony.
There is also the opening short film, which has undergone a long cycle of gestation and creation, and we hope to achieve cinematic presentation.
4] Performing arts programs, are there any emergency alternatives?
For the opening ceremony of the Asian Games, Lu Chuan and the entire main creative team of the opening ceremony spent three years. In the creation process, every stage is very difficult, artists have to constantly surpass themselves, and because of the attention of the opening ceremony of the Asian Games, there are many factors involved, concerned, and cared for, and emotions. How to accurately present these needs, such as Hangzhou, sports, the times, our ideals and goals, etc., must be presented through the image of art. The process of innovation is very difficult, and everyone in the team is constantly challenging themselves.
Chao News Reporter: With so many theatrical performances, are there any alternatives to prepare for emergencies?
Lu Chuan: The content of the creation is constantly changing, constantly adjusting dynamically, we have no alternatives, but we have deleted projects, and then we think of new projects as supplements, and we go forward one after another. We don't have the energy to do alternatives, but as soon as something doesn't fit is removed, something new comes in.
So our whole creation is modular. One module by one can grow independently, polish independently, and mature independently, and it will not affect all the ideologies and expressions.
Chao News Reporter: Many viewers found that this time the actors are equipped with balance cars, why is there such use?
Lu Chuan: I think the balance bike represents a sense of speed, technology and trendiness, which is in line with the aesthetics of young people. In the past two years, balance bikes have been used a lot at the opening ceremonies of large-scale sports events in China or at the opening ceremonies of theatrical performances. Considering that the venue for the square performance is very large, it is not realistic to rely solely on the actors to run. After having a balance bike, not only is it very silky to move, the speed has gone up, and it is also beautiful and flowing, so many choreographers like to use balance bikes.
Chao News Reporter: Now that the Asian Games have begun, what is your biggest feeling? What games will you go to?
Lu Chuan: I don't have any special feelings or want to say, just want to sleep and relax, and then go back to film work with all my strength, not only "749 Bureau" to produce, but also new projects to promote.
After the opening ceremony, I will also come to Hangzhou often, and Hangzhou is like a second hometown for me. And the Asian Games are still a long time away, and I definitely want to come back and watch the games, see the men's team, basketball, badminton and so on. Moreover, my wife will be stationed on the front line of the Asian Games as a staff member of the CCTV broadcast team, and when the National Day holiday the children may also be free, they plan to bring their children to Hangzhou to watch the game and reunite the whole family.
Chao News Reporter Lu Fang Intern Wang Yifei