Yuqin Wang (Portland) is a traditional Chinese Rod Puppeteer. Before coming to America, Yuqin Wang, and her husband and fellow performer, Zhengli Xu, were both leading puppeteers with the famous China Puppet Art Troupe for more than 30 years. Yuqin Wang, a 2012 Oregon Folklife Network Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program Master Artist, was honored by the National Endowment for the Arts in 2004 when she received the National Heritage Fellowship Award, the highest honor our nation gives to folk and traditional artists.
Bio
Yuqin Wang, born in Beijing, China, is a master performer of Chinese rod puppetry. At the age of ten, Wang began training in the Beijing Opera School. At 18, Wang turned to traditional rod puppetry, weaving elements of traditional Chinese Opera into this ancient art. Her innovations earned her lead roles in more than thirty puppet shows, numerous films and television programs. In Portland, Wang and Xu founded their own puppet theatre, Dragon Art Studio, performing the featured roles for each show. In the studio’s first year, Dragon Art Studio performed at the Atlanta Summer Olympics. Since then, Wang and Xu have shared the beauty and excitement of Chinese rod puppetry with audiences throughout the Pacific Northwest. The company has toured nationally and internationally, regularly taking puppet performances to schools, libraries, museums, and community centers. Xu and Wang produced and performed a big production of “Flaming Mountains the Monkey King’s Adventure,” which took over a year to develop, choreograph, and produce. In 2007, Wang and Xu successfully presented the complex show at the Winningstad Theatre (Portland Center for the Performing Arts). Chinese puppetry is a dramatic form that goes back more than 2,000 years, with roots in ritual performance, and a history of court and then popular entertainment. Rod puppets, 30-42 inches in length, consist of a solid torso with arms, a large central rod supports the puppet, and two smaller rods operate the figure’s hands. Puppeteers work behind a 5-6 foot curtain whose top edge creates the stage floor over which the puppets perform. The puppets enact traditional stories derived from mythology, history, and folk-literature drama.
