Due to featured characteristics, from being an art with folk elements, Water Puppet rapidly becomes a traditional Vietnamese art. Water Puppet is an art form of Wet Rice Civilization. The essence of Vietnam Water Puppet is admired by international friends. Have you seen it? Share your impressions in the comments below! Some venues for watching a water puppetry showĪddress: 57B Dinh Tien Hoang Street, HanoiĪddress: 55B Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street, Ho Chi Minh CityĬheck out even more things to do in Hanoi.Due to the featured characteristics, from being an art with folk elements, Water Puppet rapidly becomes a traditional art. No trip to Vietnam is complete without a water puppets show, it's an experience not to be missed. There is also a small exhibition of water puppets in the building nearby. One of 16 Vietnamese folk water puppetry troupes performs there every Saturday and Sunday, four times a day. The pavilion was built in a traditional style similar to that of the Thay Pagoda pavilion dating several hundred years back. Later on the same trip, I was in the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology and learned that in November 2015 a new open air pavilion for water puppet performances had been opened there. Water puppetry in the Museum of Ethnology The show was about one hour long and left a distinctive and lasting impression. The performance was concluded by dances of four animals sacred in Vietnam: a dragon, a unicorn, a tortoise, and a phoenix. It’s Hoan Kiem Lake in the centre of Hanoi, with the Turtle Tower on the island. Hence the name of the lake – “The Returned Sword”. After the victory, the Golden Tortoise God appeared to claim the sword back when Le Roi was boating on a lake in Hanoi. As legend has it, he was granted a sword by deities to win the war. There was also the traditional sketch of Le Loi returning the sword, Le Loi being a national hero and the leader of the resistance against foreign invasion in the 15th century. There were fourteen sketches, all in all, portraying agricultural work, catching frogs, chasing a duck-hunting fox, and fishing, among others. The show started with a folk music composition played by a Vietnamese orchestra on traditional music instruments: drums, wooden bells, horns, bamboo flutes, and cymbals. The audience comprised mostly adult foreign tourists, but some children too. The ticket cost 100 000 dongs, about 5 USD. I still happily bought it as it was my only chance to watch such a performance on that trip. When it was my turn in the short line at the ticket office, I was told they only had a few tickets left for the last performance of the day, at 8 p.m. I went to buy a ticket first thing in the morning on the day of the show. I had an opportunity to watch a show at the Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre in Hanoi. The world-famous Thang Long Water Puppet Theatre Water puppetry is a popular form of entertainment nowadays too, especially for local children and foreigners discovering Vietnamese folk culture. A water puppet show typically depicts Vietnamese day-to-day rural life along with important historical events and ancient legends. While puppets move around, directed by puppeteers standing waist-deep in the water behind the stage, singers tell their stories in songs. It also conceals puppet strings and puppeteer movements, improves musical and vocal acoustics, and provides a shimmering lighting effect.Įach water puppet is hand-carved and given five layers of lacquer paint to make it waterproof and add vibrant colours to the performance. Water is both the stage and a symbolic link to the rice harvest at water puppetry shows. Villagers in the delta of the Red River and in other rice-growing regions of Northern Vietnam staged water puppet performances at religious and end-of-harvest festivals, and on other important occasions. Vietnamese water puppetry is a unique folk art practiced since the 11th century.
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