In 1894, Mei Lanfang was born in a pear garden family in Beijing, on stage, he was a pretty flower Dan in a neon dress, and offstage, he was Mei Lanfang in a suit and leather shoes. He pioneered the fashion Peking Opera, he led the troupe to tour abroad, and he was an outstanding ambassador of cultural exchanges between China and the West. After the founding of New China, he ascended the Tiananmen Tower and grew from a generation of famous artists to people's artists.
Mei Lanfang, who came from a Family of Peking Opera, learned opera at the age of 7 and took the stage at the age of 10. In his more than 50 years of stage career, he has innovated and developed the singing voice, recitation, dance, music, costumes, makeup and other aspects of Peking Opera Danjiao, forming a unique "Mei Pai" art style. In the history of the development of Peking Opera art in China, Mei Lanfang is a performing artist who inherits the past and opens up the future.
Mr. Mei Lanfang in this photo, wearing a suit and leather shoes, holding a Western-style camera in his hand, is a very fashionable and foreign style even if it is placed today. At that time, Mei Lanfang, although she was a popular Peking Opera actor in Beijing, practiced traditional tongzi gong, but when she stepped off the stage, she was a modernist youth who led the new wave, and the styles on and off the stage were very different. This also reflects from the side that Mr. Mei has the courage to accept new things, and he also integrates this kind of thinking into artistic creation very naturally.
In 1916, Mei Lanfang and her team created the fashion Peking Opera "A Wisp of Hemp" performance, this drama changed the traditional Peking Opera costume style, Mei Lanfang's heroine, dressed in modern costumes and sang Peking Opera, bringing unprecedented visual impact to the audience and causing huge social repercussions. In the play, whether Mei Lanfang sings, reads, or makes a watch, she can closely follow the characters and plot, breaking through some traditional performance programs. Mr. Mei Lanfang makes a lot of use of modern and fashionable elements in Beijing opera, and he is also known as the "founding father" of fashion Peking Opera.
This photo is a photo of Mei Lanfang receiving an honorary doctorate at the Bomona College in the United States in 1930. Mei Lanfang's performance in the United States is not only sought after by the public, but also highly valued by the American education community. Pomona College in Los Angeles and the University of Southern California awarded him honorary doctorates, respectively. This is a cautious recognition of Mei Lanfang's performing arts by the American academic circles, and it is also a reward for his outstanding contributions to Sino-US cultural exchanges.
In order to rebuff the constant harassment of the Japanese, Mei Lanfang decided to "grow a beard and mingzhi". Mei Lanfang recalled this experience, "At that time, I only felt that the situation was getting more and more serious, and I had to find a way to deal with it." One morning I was shaving my face in the mirror and suddenly thought, If only I could grow a beard like Tagore's. So I didn't shave my face for three days, and my beard grew so fast that my mustache soon grew up. Although I didn't become a hairdresser on my chest, I didn't expect that this really became a trump card for me to refuse to perform! ”
In 1959, when the people of the whole country were celebrating the tenth anniversary of the founding of New China, Mei Lanfang, who was then the director of the Peking Opera House of China, was full of patriotic enthusiasm and rehearsed the Peking opera "Mu Guiying Hangs Commander" in just over a month. "Who's going to be the commander-in-chief if I don't?" Who doesn't lead the troops? The play is based on the Henan Yu opera of the same name, through the story of Mu Guiying's command to conquer the enemy of the Western Xia invasion, interpreting the deeds of the Yang family to defend the border pass and heroically resist the enemy. The "Meipai Art" founded by Mei Lanfang is regarded as a milestone in the history of the development of Peking Opera.