On May 8th
2014, Southampton welcomed two guest speakers from Hong Kong. Victor Tong, a
lecturer in Fashion and Image design at the Hong Kong Design Institute, and
Pacino Wang, award winning designer whose clothing has been worn by Hong Kong
celebrities, came in to educate students of Solent University.
Due to an
unfortunate clash of commitments, I had to return home for two days, which
resulted in my misfortune of the inability to attend the lecture. This has led
me to make my own research to find out more about what they discussed. The
topics of the lecture were ‘The Fashion Battlefield in China’ and ‘Chinese
Opera Mask Art and Chinese Tradition’.
As a result
of finding nothing on ‘The Fashion Battlefield in China’ through the internet,
I had a brief discussion with a classmate who informed me of the general
concept of the topic. In China it is extremely difficult to get yourself
started due to the minimal space and financial expenses. Pacino Wang shared his
difficulties in starting up as a Designer and the struggles he faced. He shared
his experiences with having to experiment with various layouts in his minute
shops so that he could display his clothes ingeniously to create a highly
efficient way for all items to be visible. The struggle in shop capacity comes from
the main root of the problem, the high and competitive prices of property. It
became a vicious cycle and he explained how hard the struggle to emerge as a
designer was. From this, Wang shared his success with the students and
presented impressive collections via image.
Victor Tong
then went on to share his knowledge of the topic ‘Chinese Opera Mask Art and
Chinese Tradition’. I searched the Chinese Opera masks and found some beautiful
designs. I was intrigued to discover how the different colours were all used to
portray a character’s role and illustrate their emotional state and general
character. Each colour has a metaphorical meaning to be an obvious help of the
understanding of character for the viewers. Gold and silver (metallics) are often
used for gods and spirits. Red indicates loyalty, intelligence and bravery. Purple
represents sophistication. White is used on the villain and suggests they are
sinister, evil and suspicious. Blue often indicates a neutral character and represents
somebody who is very loyal. But blue can also suggest stubborness. Green represents
a violent character with a lack of self control. Black can show the character
is fierce and rough, but can also mean they may be neutral.
Yellow indicates
ambition but can also mean they are sly. Pink often suggests the character is
comedic. These colours were either worn in masks, or painted on to the actors’
faces.
After
researching these topics, it really saddens me that I could not attend the
lecture as they appear to be very interesting points of conversation. Questions
I would have loved to ask would include:
·
Is it still very hard to emerge as a fashion
designer in China?
·
Why is it so expensive?
·
Do Chinese Operas still happen today?
