In this respect, traditional Chinese opera costumes were deeply influenced by life in Ming Dynasty.
According to the laws of the Ming Dynasty, people are not allowed to use yellow, and the official uniforms of civil and military officials are one to four, and those below five are blue and green (Ming Shi).
The same is true of China traditional opera costumes.
Yellow (yellow or bright yellow) is used by emperors; Among other colors, red is precious and purple is the complementary color of red; Followed by green and blue; Black is the most humble, so Cheng Yi and officials wear green, poor scholars wear rich clothes, family courtyards wear sea green, officials wear green robes and poor women wear Tsing Yi.
This is only from the perspective of performance level. From another angle, for example, when expressing a character's temperament, black has different meanings. It can mean complete or rough, and so on.
(2) show customs.
Red is generally regarded as a luxury color, but when the festival scene appears, it reflects the characteristics of China customs.
On the stage of national drama, prisoners who are about to be executed should wear plain red clothes and trousers, and officials who supervise the execution should wear red official uniforms and red cloaks, which is also a tortuous reflection of customs.
Killing people is a terrible thing. In order to avoid evil spirits and get good luck, we should use red.
In China custom, a white dress is mourning. Relatives of the deceased in the play wear white clothes or wrap a piece of white cloth around their heads as a souvenir.
This refers to white.
As for white pythons, white backs and embroidered white arrow clothes, they are not limited to this.
(3) performance.
For example, Lin Chong in Running at Night is dressed in black according to the costume of Kunqu Opera.
Black is not used here to show poverty or humility, but to highlight the word "night".
Later, Yang Xiaolou made a set of green arrow clothes, and replaced the green satin with green velvet, which has good light absorption and looks darker, and strengthened the depiction of the night scene.
(4) show psychology and temperament.
The youth roles played by Xiao Sheng and Xiao Dan on the stage are often brightly dressed, which accords with the general youth psychology.
But the same young people also express different spiritual temperament through colors.
Therefore, Mei Lanfang said that Du Liniang in A Dream in the Garden was an official girl with beautiful clothes, but also a talented woman. "Beauty lies in elegance" (Collected Works of Mei Lanfang, page 50).
Many costumes on the stage of China opera are influenced by novel descriptions, but the long-term spread of these costumes is also inseparable from their successful performance of characters.
Guan Yu, for example, used to be red-faced and red-robed in Northern Opera, but it was only in the Ming Dynasty that he changed to red-faced and green-robed.
This is influenced by the romance of the Three Kingdoms.
This change is very meaningful.
The treatment of red face and red robe gives people a hot feeling, which is suitable for people like Meng Liang; Putting on a red face and a green robe will help to show Guan Yu's personality characteristics, such as being literate, martial, smart and brave.
(5) Show the beauty of the overall effect of the stage.
When we often perform the scene of handsome men's salary increase on the stage, a group of generals wear recliners of different colors.
If we want to examine why A wears red, B wears green, C wears white and D wears black one by one, we may not find any special basis.
In fact, it is also necessary to rely on different colors to make the stage colorful, make the audience look "bright", and also create a certain atmosphere for the marshal to raise his account.
Early operas were not like this. Usually, a master wears the same clothes.
For example, in the Ming Dynasty's Northern Opera "Hulao Pass vs. Lu Bu", twenty generals appeared, not only wearing the same clothes, but also with the same mouths and weapons.
This technique was only used for soldiers, officials, captains and maids in later opera performances.
These are two basic ways to express the overall color effect of the stage: the former emphasizes the beauty of characteristics, and the latter emphasizes the beauty of neatness.
These two techniques are often used alternately to set off the beauty of characteristics with the beauty of neatness.
Such as "Two Generals", Zhang Feihei and Ma Chaobai, this is the characteristic beauty; Soldiers from both sides made the two commanders stand out with their neat beauty.
Of course, the so-called characteristic beauty and neat beauty are both comparisons.
For example, soldiers' clothes, as far as they are concerned, are a kind of neat beauty in color and style, but compared with the neat beauty of walk-on and maid-in-waiting, they show their own characteristics.
The patterns in traditional Chinese opera costumes are not only beautiful decorations, but also have certain symbolic significance.
For example, "Python", one of the decorative themes in China traditional opera costumes, is a symbol of feudal authority and dignity.
In real life, pythons are snake-like animals without horns and claws, but in the Ming Dynasty, pythons had horns and claws, similar to dragons, and only one claw was missing compared with dragons.
In feudal times, dragons were not allowed in costumes, so pythons were used instead.
Now it's a combination of dragon and python.
Another decorative theme is Phoenix.
In ancient legends, the phoenix is the king of birds, so the combination of phoenix and dragon (python) in costumes is a symbol of lack of sovereignty. Empresses and concubines often wear phoenixes.
But the wind is not as sacred as the dragon, and it is also widely used by the people.
Combined with the sun and peony, it can symbolize light, peace, happiness and love, so the phoenix pattern is widely used in opera from headdress to clothing.
The opening and pleating of military commanders often use animal patterns such as tigers and lions to symbolize the bravery of the role.
Wen Sheng's pleats are made of plum, orchid, bamboo and chrysanthemum, which are often related to his identity and temperament.
Counselors use taiji diagrams and gossip to symbolize their wisdom or Taoist thoughts.
Others, such as the bat pattern, Ruyi pattern and Shou Ziwen, symbolize good luck.
Some purely decorative patterns are generally not the main body.
In the layout of the pattern, there are various patterns such as fullness, mass, edge, corner and broken branches.
At present, there are only pythons, lying clothes and palace clothes tattooed all over the floor. And pleats, wallets, etc. Most of them are group development and angular.
Middle-aged people mostly use group flowers, while young people use side flowers, corner flowers and broken branches.
Patterns can give clothing a certain meaning and increase its aesthetic feeling, but if used improperly, it is counterproductive.
Therefore, excellent actors are not only strict about the choice of clothing styles and colors, but also very particular about the use and how to use patterns.
Some characters should wear plain clothes, and never engage in flower embroidery.
There is an example in Gai Jiaotian's Black Powder Spring and Autumn Annals: In the old days, a theater owner thought that Song Wu was not beautiful in black, and wanted to pay Song Wu to "exchange the pleats and trousers embroidered with lions and hydrangeas for an egg-blue silk face", but Gai Jiaotian refused.
If Song Wu wears this kind of flower pleats, it is not Ximen Qing.
The white snake in Mei Lanfang's Golden Mountain Temple once used three sets of white underwear and battle skirts with different patterns: one embroidered with black lines and ancient coins, one embroidered with eight flowers, and the other embroidered with three blue flowers.
After comparing the performance methods, he thought that "a set of ancient coin patterns appeared, covering the whole body in a dark way, slightly diluting the white luster, and the coin patterns were dull and not fairy."
A set of eight regiments is a bit old-fashioned, but it smells like the white arrow clothes worn by Wu Zixu and Xue, or the embroidered "three blue flowers with twigs are the most beautiful".
Mei Lanfang concluded from this: "The structure of patterns can sometimes change the effect of texture and color under certain conditions.
"("Mei Lanfang on Stage Art ") This is quite right.
In addition, the material of clothing will also affect the color effect of the stage.
All kinds of silk and cotton fabrics can enrich the levels and changes of stage colors because of their different light and dark textures.
At the same time, it can also set off each other, so that both gorgeous and simple are strengthened.
Therefore, we should not underestimate the use of cotton fabrics.
In the past, Kunqu opera was strict, and it was necessary to wear silk and satin.