The Chinese Face-Painting Art

Over 10 years ago, a couple gave this beautiful and precious face-painting art piece to our family as a Christmas gift. They bought it in Hong Kong during The Second World War. Today, I would love to share the art to you.

The Chinese face-paintin art was developed from the mask painting art which was initiated by Lang-Ling Hwang in the Pei-Gee dynasty and by Wu-Hsiang Dee in the Song dynasty. The painted masks were originally used in the fields of battle to make dreadful figures to frighten the enemy. Later on the masks were employed in the stage to show.

Social standing and disposition of characters. Owing to difficulty and inconvenience of manufacturing and wearing masks, the colors were directly painted on the faces, afterwards. Generally speaking, the face without painting represents faithful and nice fellows, the multi-colored face represents wicked people, the red face represents loyal and straight characters, the black face represent bravery and preseverance. The buffoons are painted with coloured spots. Up to now, there are many types of face-painting. The Tien-Kong Arts Association is the now painting various faces of Chinese historical figures for the purpose of popular enjoyment.