DIFFERENT FORMS OF VIETNAMESE PUPPETRY ART.
Before becoming an art performance, national puppetry grouped together into guilds in villages. The performances depended on the puppeteers’ passion, money labor contribution and fellow villages’ help. Each guild kept their secret methods and they were passed from father to son with oath, which hindered the wide development in performing art. Due to this, a lot of interesting performances disappeared when the puppeteers died. Many art creations only existed in some regions in some periods. Water puppetry spread mainly in Northern Delta and midlands areas of Vietnam.
Respectively, string-puppets, shadow-puppets, Tay Nguyen puppet troops appeared in the border areas of Cao Bang, in Kien Giang, in funerals. Hand puppets were only performed in some pagodas in Nam Dinh province, Hanoi, Thai Binh province…Vietnamese people, in the early time, knew how to perform puppets in a various ways.
Toy-puppets
To some extend, puppetry art, in fact, is a derivation from the old-aged religious plastic art and children games. The successive movements of people and animals shapes in Chinese lantern remind us of shadow-puppets. Flattened puppet troops are similar to fighting cock toys, woodcutting, and stick-playing games which adults buy for children. The two dummies "General" are usually hanging on the bamboo tree. Whenever the wind blows, they seem to fight each other. This toy is a kind of rope-puppets. The Lion dances, Dragon dances appeared on puppet stage, toy-making art for children become the most expecting performances in and-puppet stage, water puppetry such as swinging, tree climbing…
Kite-puppets and wind-puppets
A kite is considered as a cultural factor, especially in South East Asia. In Vietnam, kite flying has become an old-aged traditional activity. Kite-flying competitions are attractive entertainment in village festivals. The melody of bamboo flute in the air blows away sultry summer days and brings the villagers sweet memories and sweet dreams. The structure, the colour of a kite and the force of the wind make it fly flexibly. It looks vivid as a puppet controlled by a puppeteer. At present, Hue kite-flying club is trying to nourish talents and make kite flying become part of the traditional culture. Wind-puppets are also made of wood and take advance of wind force to fly.
Machinery-puppets: moveable parts of the puppets are created in order that the wind can blow them to make them move. Some movements such as: playing music and striking bells are really lively. To USSR puppeteers, wind-puppets are used as ornaments that are hung on gates or gardens. In Vietnam, two "general fighting each other" is a kind of this form.
Firecrackers-puppets
Firecrackers are perfect harmony of art and puppetry technique. These are fireworks, consisting of different kinds of explosive crackers and sparklers. They are divided into many stories. The size of each storey is about 40 x 40 m. The machinery-puppets, surrounded by fireworks made use of the crackers explosion force to move. They are also remote operated by strings or poles. Thanks to the sparkle of fireworks and the sound of the firecrackers, puppeteers manipulate puppets in different stories such as wrestling storey, fighting cocks storey, husking storey… "Phao tro" (or firecrackers) are successive picture display in front of the spectators. The explosion and miracle light of fireworks are the most expecting events in village festivals.
