Chapter Three: “The Picture Must Have Theater”: Performing Narrativity in

The picture must have theater, or the myriad viewers will be bored. It must produce

auspicious words if it is to please the people. The figures must be elegant and handsome,

to attract people’s admiration. 􀀁

􀟂􁇏􁀱􁂵􀼤􀄑􀏤􀥁􀒌􀒂􀭈􀄑􀔛􀥧􁀱􀠝􀧦􀄑􀒌􀬿􀞆􀲦􁁩􀄑􀲦􀯖􁀱􀤮􀾮􀄑􀬿􀖤􀲦􀟋􀼟􀀏􀀁

􀀁

Popular rhyme among Mianzhu’s nianhua makers

While a study of the ritual print practices tied to the seasonal markets opens up

the nianhua archive to a broader range of printed and painted ephemera in daily life, this

chapter will unpack the archive by rethinking the issue of narrativity in nianhua. This is a

critical issue in the study of nianhua because many existing studies categorize nianhua

according to its narrative content, as images based on narratives drawn from theater,

historical episodes, or legends and myths. Nianhua authority Wang Shucun, for instance,

has recently published a volume on what he calls “theater-based nianhua ” 􀼤􀔛􀭍􀟂.212 In

this work, Wang draws together a large body of prints across time and space (mostly

from northern print centers) that directly reference historical stage dramas. According to

Wang, theater-based nianhua emerged in greater quantities as regional theater expanded

in the Ming and Qing dynasties, when the works played a key role in disseminating elite

social values and in providing entertainment and storytelling opportunities to the lower

classes. To demonstrate the close ties between the theater and printing industries, Wang

matches each print with the characters, scenarios, and narrative plots found in the

corresponding theater production.

212 Wang Shucun 􀺦􀶎􀕨, Zhongguo xichu nianhua 􁇏􀝓􀼤􀔛􀭍􀟂 [Chinese theatre-based nianhua] (Beijing:

Beijing gongyi meishu chubanshe, 2006), 3.

Wang’s study situates nianhua as illustrations or counterparts of a prior text,

including both written and oral texts such as theater scripts, excerpts of vernacular

fiction, or other historical texts. In doing so, the image becomes representative of a larger

narrative or set of narratives, serving a communicative role to translate them into visual

media. This is central to Wang’s argument that theater-based nianhua allowed theatrical

performances to be relived inside the home, as an inexpensive form of mass

entertainment that would prompt storytelling, singing, and the sharing of instructive

lessons for the younger generation. Since Wang’s research into this topic focuses

primarily on the nianhua of north China, he has not addressed the incredibly rich theater

traditions of Sichuan and their profound influence on Sichuan’s printmaking industries.

Wang’s approach here is mirrored in the Western scholarship on nianhua,

including art historian Catherine Pagani’s study of Chinese popular prints based on the

classic novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms 􀳘􀝓􁀆􁁬. Like Wang, Pagani argues that

the prints “reinforced ideas presented in theater” by “presenting the same tales and

promoting the same cultural ideals.”213 For Pagani, theater also “provided the context for

an image that would allow for a full understanding and enjoyment of a Three Kingdoms

print.”214 Similarly, sinologist Li-ling Hsiao has argued that the many printed illustrations

of theater performances found in the published plays of the Ming period are also designed

to evoke the experience of theater for readers. Hsiao uses the term “performance

213 Catherine Pagani, “The Theme of Three Kingdoms in Chinese Popular Woodblock Prints,” in Three

Kingdoms and Chinese Culture, eds. Kimberly Besio and Constantine Tung (Albany: State University of

New York Press, 2007), 103.

214 Ibid., 94.

illustration” instead of “narrative illustration” to stress the emphasis on theatricality

found in these images.215

In this chapter, I will argue that depictions of theater in Mianzhu nianhua play

into a whole range of issues beyond simply conveying a narrative or evoking a theatrical

performance, although these elements are certainly present. Instead of approaching

nianhua as symbolic or communicative devices that represent an existing narrative or

performance, I will stress their role as catalysts for creative storytelling sessions where

references to theater can take on new meaning and ritual significance. Drawing on a

growing body of scholarship that examines the limitations of interpreting visual media as

fixed linear narratives, I will underscore this issue of performativity and push for a

rethinking of established categories such as theatre-based nianhua or narrative-based

nianhua.

In her study of Chinese “narrative illustration,” art historian Julia Murray has

pointed to the fact that there is no traditional term or category for “narrative” in the

Chinese literary tradition, a problem long recognized by literary specialists.216 Murray

thus warns against imposing a “core narrative” upon images that might actually call up

multiple narratives and interpretations for different viewers.217 Keeping this issue in

mind, Murray argues that it is still worthwhile to analyze different forms of narrative

illustration in relation to the written narratives found in Chinese cultural discourses. For

215 Li-ling Hsiao, The Eternal Present of the Past: Illustration, Theater, and Reading in the Wanli Period

(Leiden: Brill, 2007): introduction.

216 This particular issue is dealt with in Sheldon Hsiao-peng Lu, From Historicity to Fictionality: The

Chinese Poetics of Narrative (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), 37-52.

217On this issue, Murray cites Barbara Herrnstein Smith, who challenges the structuralist notion that primal

core stories underlie all manifestations of a particular narrative. For Smith, there are only versions or

retellings of stories that are constructed in relation to each other, for specific purposes and within particular

contexts. Julia K. Murray, Mirror of Morality: Chinese Narrative Illustration and Confucian Ideology

(Honolulu: University of Hawai'i, 2007), 10.

Murray, the essential characteristic of narrative “is that something happens. There is a

story, which means that one or more events occur in a sequence of time… in terms of

visual art, narrative illustration might then be defined as a picture that relates a story”

(author’s italics).218

In contrast to Murray, art historian Efrat Biberman has argued for an alternate

conception of narrative illustration that does not take for granted the existence of

coherent temporal orders within images. Biberman argues that paintings do not unfold

temporally in the same way as written or verbal texts. Although the notion of narrative

structure has been recast as a “meta-concept valid for various human activities” since the

writings of Roland Barthes, there is still the tendency to bring various literary

assumptions to bear on images. This includes the assumption that a “painting is a

coherent, decipherable object” that can be “solved” with a narrative interpretation and

that a painting may bear a “coherent structure within a given temporal order” and that this

order is “fully available to the viewing subject.”219

Challenging these assumptions, Biberman points to the “persistent gap between

the picture and the narrative discourse it entails,” which always produces “a visual

surplus that cannot be verbalized.”220 Instead of imposing a temporal narrative structure

upon a picture, Biberman argues that “viewing a picture is fragmentary by nature; its

temporality is not necessarily successive and does not correlate with the strict criteria that

narrative structure demands.”221 For Biberman, a theory of “narrativity in the visual field”

must therefore acknowledge how “every viewer, in a sense, reinvents the narrativity she

218 Murray, Mirror of Morality, 12.

219 Efrat Biberman, “On Narrativity in the Visual Field: A Psychoanalytic View of Velazquez's Las

Meninas,” Narrative 14, no. 3 (2006): 241.

220 Ibid., 237.

221 Ibid.

finds in a picture.” Depending on the situation, this may or may not involve the narrative

components such as “series of events, time duration, causal connections and plot.”222

In this chapter, I will contribute to this by adding that it is not only the “visual

surplus” or lack of temporal order that sets pictures apart from other written or verbal

narratives. The very notion of the “visual field” must also be qualified to address the

multi-sensorial, embodied, and culturally specific modes of engagement with images. To

do this, I will draw on the critical work of visual studies scholars and anthropologists who

have complicated the very category of the “visual.” As visual studies scholar Mieke Bal

has convincingly argued, the “act of looking is profoundly ‘impure’” in that it is

“inherently synaesthetic” and an act that is “framed, framing, interpreting, affect-laden,

cognitive and intellectual.” 223 There is certainly greater need to trouble the disciplinary

divides separating the visual and non-visual realms of activity, as productive topics of

critique rather than policed boundaries.

Along the same lines, anthropologist Christopher Pinney has set forth the notion

of “corpothetics” to move beyond debates concerned with the aesthetic value of art. In his

study of popular religious prints in contemporary India, Pinney defines the notion of

“corpothetics” as “the sensory embrace of images, the bodily engagement that most

people (except Kantians and Modernists) have with artworks.”224 In shifting the analysis

from aesthetics to corpothetics, Pinney attempts to “transpose the discussion of aesthetics

onto political grounds” by acknowledging how the agency and social significance of

popular prints are produced within “fields of conflict” that inform everyday life in the

222 Ibid.

223 Mieke Bal, “Visual essentialism and the object of visual culture,” Journal of Visual Culture 2, no. 5

(2003): 9.

224 Christopher Pinney, “Piercing the Skin of the Idol,” in Beyond Aesthetics: Art and the Technologies of

Enchantment, ed. Chris Pinney and Nicholas Thomas (Oxford and New York: Berg, 2001), 158.

“messy reality of India.” Instead of framing the issues around the stylistic or formal

features of the prints, Pinney’s emphasis is on “bodily praxis” or the “poetics of

materiality and corporeality around the images.”225

In the discussions below, I will use these theoretical advances to rethink the role

of narrativity in nianhua and to ask the question: What is at stake, politically and

historically, in these embodied practices of narrativity that lie beyond the archive? To

tackle this question from a few different angles, I will first draw on interview sessions

with local printmakers who strategically deploy a range of performative gestures and

storytelling techniques to boost the social capital of their workshops and their nianhua

products. These knowledgeable producers creatively perform their mastery of nianhua in

ways that directly meet the needs of the situation at hand, often using voice, gesture, eye

contact, rhythm, and other storytelling conventions to shape the social relations between

speaker and audience. I will then build on this discussion by connecting these

“corpothetic” practices to the many gestures, costumes, sounds, props, and famous

characters of theatre that appear in a wide range of nianhua, where they are transformed

and put to new uses in the home or marketplace by nianhua consumers. In doing so, I

will attempt to uncover some of the parallels between Sichuan’s ritual theater traditions

and the nianhua industry that have been concealed by folk art typologies that organize

works according to function or format.

Instead of treating only certain works as narrative illustrations, I will argue that

the embodied practices of narrativity are not reserved for a special class of nianhua.

Instead, many works serve as sites of “narrative density,” a term I will use to describe

how nianhua are densely packed with narrative cues (such as mnemonic and aural cues)

225 Ibid., 169.

that give rise to a range of narrative possibilities to be activated by knowledgeable

viewers. This notion of narrative density is illuminated in the interview sessions

discussed, but it also pushes for an alternate interpretation of a high profile nianhua

“treasure,” a set of late Qing dynasty scroll paintings titled Greeting Spring 􁂒􀔽􀹭 (fig.

56). While existing interpretations treat the work as a narrative illustration that unfolds

temporally due to the presence of repeating figures in a street parade, I will argue that the

painting can be understood as a site of narrative density, where a range of narratives may

be activated to suit the immediate needs of its elite patrons and users. In particular, I will

argue that the prevalent use of rebus imagery suggests that the painting was both

designed and used as a ritually efficacious image to activate auspicious speech. The key

goal here is to recover the role of narrativity within the ritual context of this important

work, and thus establish a way forward for recuperating the ritual significance of many

other historic nianhua.

The Medicine King: Performative Gestures and the Art of Storytelling

I will begin with a critique of a storytelling session that vividly captures how an

experienced speaker weaves together a narrative through embodied interactions with the

many visual cues in a nianhua painting as well as the live audience. In particular, I will

draw attention to the use of performative gestures as a key element of the corpothetics or

“bodily praxis” of nianhua storytelling, where the speaker’s embodied movements

activate and animate an image while shaping the social relations in the room.

Comparative literature scholar Carrie Noland has theorized performative gestures as a

“technique of the body,” whether conscious or not, that involves “any use of the body

that can become a source of kinesthetic feedback, and thus agency.” Noland argues that

all gestures are performative in the sense that they shape and transform everyday

experiences, be it “communicative, instrumental, or aesthetic.” Relying on both learned

routines and direct engagement with what Martin Heidegger calls “everyday being in the

world,” performative gestures may indicate and instantiate requests, refusals, pleas,

invitations, and other powerful social actions.226

The interview session detailed below was recorded during a visit to Wang

Xingru’s home studio in 2007, after we had developed a degree of familiarity from

previous visits, as documented in the last chapter. There was an established

understanding that I was only loosely connected to the official revival movement and that

I would be recording our conversation for a graduate research project in Canada.227 On

this day, graduate art history student Han Gang accompanied me and translated some of

the local dialect terms into Mandarin when they came up in conversation. He had also

met Wang on previous visits. Ning and Liu, the two scholars who introduced me to Wang

also joined us on this visit, as they were interested in Wang’s stories for their own

nianhua research. At first, I was not sure how their official status would affect the

interview process. However, I soon observed that they had formed a long-standing

friendship with Wang, who spoke openly and intimately on many potentially taboo

subjects in their presence, including the Cultural Revolution, popular religion, and ritual

nianhua practices. I also learned that Wang only agreed to share his stories with me

because Ning and Liu ardently supported my research and prepared him for my visit.

226 Carrie Noland, Agency and Embodiment: Performing Gestures/Producing Culture (Cambridge:

Harvard University Press, 2009), 15-16.

227 While Chen and Li were accustomed to visits from the media and the presence of a video camera, Wang

claims to have had few encounters with cameras, researchers, and journalists. However, he seemed to

ignore the camera completely and looked directly at his audience when speaking.

During our informal group interview, which was conducted in the local dialect,

Wang recounted much of his life story to us and then invited us into his studio to view his

works (figs. 45, 46). The only work that he chose to narrate at length is a mounted

vertical scroll painting of the “Medicine King” (yaowang 􁀰􀺦 or yiwang 􁁄􀺦) (fig. 47).

The Medicine King figure, also translated as the “Medicine Deity” or the “God of

Medicine and Healing,” has a long and complex legacy in the history of the healing and

medicinal trades, popular religion, and in painting, printmaking, sculpture, and temple

building.228 Scholars have traced the origins of the Medicine King figure to the Buddhist

canon, where the term first appears in translations of Buddhist writings concerning the

Medicine Buddha.229 While the nature and identity of the Medicine King has evolved

over time, during the Ming and Qing periods he was most widely identified with the Tang

dynasty physician and Daoist adept Sun Simiao 􀷤􀶱􁝟 (581-682), who is still honored

today in most Medicine King temples across China.230 In Sichuan, many Medicine King

temples were recuperated after the Cultural Revolution, a development that was closely

tied to the resurgence of Sichuan’s lucrative medicinal herb industry and the rise of

temple tourism in the region.231

When I asked Wang Xingru to tell us about his painting of the Medicine King,

Wang explained that traditional Chinese doctors often carried pictures of the Medicine

228 Susan Naquin provides an analysis of Beijing’s many Medicine King temples during the Ming and Qing

dynasties, providing accounts of their diverse origins and how these temples have evolved. See Susan

Naquin, Peking: Temples and City Life, 1400-1900 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000). For a

discussion of Medicine King lore and reproductions of Medicine King prints, paintings, and sculptures, see

Paul Unschuld, Medicine in China: Historical Artifacts and Images (Munich: Prestel Verlag, 2000).

229 The Medicine King has been identified with many physicians and Daoist adepts over the dynasties,

including Bianque 􀑋􀲐􀀁(ca. 500 BCE), Wei Shanjun 􀺳􀳿􀤮 (595-694), and Sun Simiao 􀷤􀶱􁝟 (581-682).

230 Yuan-ling Chao, Medicine and Society in Late Imperial China: A Study of Physicians in Suzhou, 1600-

1850 (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 2009), 71.

231 Cha Qing 􀒰􀱩 and Lei Xiaopeng 􀧂􀽫􀮵, “The modern development of Sun Simiao worship and

Medicine King Festival practices in Western Sichuan” 􀔫􀼆􀷤􀶱􁝟􀔌􀏨􀄑􁀰􀺦􀟶􀼝􀷌􀠣􀰃􀽃􀕽􀤷􀘿, Sichuan

jiaoyu xueyuan xuebao 􀶹􀔫􀢝􁃢􀿐􁃽􀿐􀐑􀀁[Journal of Sichuan’s College of Education] 12 (2007): 23.

King, especially the traveling doctors in the countryside. He then signaled to us that he

would share an orally transmitted narrative by standing straight, taking a step forward,

and reciting a line of verse. He also held his pointing stick out to his right side as if

marking out a performance space. In taking this stance, he appeared to assume the

position of authority in the room, to physically assert his role as the narrator of the story

that is to come (fig. 48). In the following excerpt of Wang’s entire story, I have included

descriptions of shifts in gesture and intonations that indicate a co-creative interaction

between his performed narrative and the painting:

There is a pair of antithetical phrases for the Medicine King that goes: “Due to

lack of pain, the dragon embarks on the open ocean. Due to a toothache, the tiger

emerges from the apricot forest.” [Here, “lack of pain” also means good health

and “apricot forest” refers to the profession of traditional Chinese medicine.] The

tiger was eating people and he happened to eat a woman who had a silver hairpin

in her hair. It got stuck in the crevice between his teeth. [Bares his teeth and

points to them.] The tiger was in terrible pain but couldn’t do anything about it.

Knowing that the Medicine King travels every day on the path by the foot of the

mountain, the tiger went to sit at the crossroads to wait for him. As soon as he saw

him coming, he started nodding, wagging his tail, and bowing with folded paws.

[Imitates the tiger’s actions and bows several times.] The Medicine King was a

traveling doctor and thus he walked long distances in all four directions and

through the hills. [Makes a large circular gesture with his stick.] His attendants

accompanied him and carried a chest of medicines. [Points to attendants in the

painting with his stick.] They would be summoned to wherever there was illness

and they could cure any ailment.

In setting up his narrative here, Wang begins by quoting a set of poetic phrases.

This is a conventional practice in casual storytelling and serves as a mnemonic for the

story to follow. The melody and rhythm of the rhyme offer mnemonic support, while

relating directly to the visual cues of the narrative, such as the tiger and dragon depicted

in the painting.232 The opening verse is thus double coded for efficiency of recall,

drawing on the auditory as well as the visual. It also establishes the authoritative

knowledge of the speaker, who is immediately positioned as an experienced narrator of

orally transmitted verse. This convention is well documented in the scholarship on

Chinese storytelling as well as the published vernacular stories of the late Ming and Qing

periods. These stories were often prefaced by a poem to evoke the rhetoric and authority

of an oral storytelling session by a professional storyteller in a teahouse.233

Wang’s swift and gestural use of the stick is significant here because the stick is

normally used to hang up and take down paintings, as it has a metal hook at the end for

this very purpose. However in just one powerful gesture, this functional tool is suddenly

transformed into a theatrical prop and pointer, bringing to life the entire scene as a

performative and theatrical space rich with semiotic possibilities. Just as the narrative

density of painting begins to unfold, one can also see how in one gesture, the narrative

density of the stick is also activated. He continues on with a renewed relationship to the

prop in hand:

When he arrived at the crossroads, he saw this yellow spotted tiger nodding and

wagging his tail. He thought it was quite strange that this fierce tiger should

appear so friendly so he approached the tiger and asked, “What are you doing

here?” [Points his stick forward to enact the role of the deity.] This is all

232 In Jan Vansina’s study of oral history, she emphasizes the role of mnemonic cues and the active nature

of recalling memories: “Studies of memory emphasize that remembering is action, indeed, creation. Its

mechanisms are cueing and scanning.” I borrow from her study the idea that mnemonic cues play a key role

in storytelling, although here the cues are both visual and verbal. Jan Vansina, Oral Tradition as History

(Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985), 42.

233 Key studies include W.L. Idema, Chinese Vernacular Fiction: The Formative Period (Leiden: Brill,

1974); Vibeke Bordahl, The Eternal Storyteller: Oral Literature in Modern China (London: Nordic

Institute of Asian Studies, 1999); and Victor Mair and Mark Bender ed., The Columbia Anthology of

Chinese Folk and Popular Literature (New York: Columbia University Press, 2011).

according to what people have said. The tiger vigorously nodded his head, pawed

at his mouth, and wagged his tail while gently approaching the Medicine King.

The Medicine King replied, “Tell me, what is the matter with you? You don’t

want to eat me?” The tiger nodded again and used his paw to point inside his

mouth. [Nods and points to enact the role of the tiger.] The Medicine King finally

understood and asked the tiger to open wide his mouth. The tiger also understood

and opened his mouth large and wide. The Medicine King took one look and saw

the silver hairpin stuck between his bleeding teeth, so he told the tiger, “You must

open your mouth wide so that I can reach inside and pull that out. Then I will take

some medicine from my chest and apply it to your mouth. But it is not possible to

do this today because if I stick my arm in your mouth, you will feel a lot of pain

and bite my arm in half!” What can be done about this?

Using gestures and shifts in his vocal intonations, Wang moves swiftly between

enacting the different roles of the Medicine King and the tiger. At this point in the

narrative, Wang takes a quick pause and speaks slightly slower to indicate another

rhythm:

This is why all traveling doctors walk through the streets and alleys with a metal

ring, which can be either copper or silver. This ring is hollow and filled with

beads, so it makes a rattling sound as the doctors walk. This is how people knew

that a doctor or herb trader was approaching.

Having inserted this side commentary in a different voice, it is clear that Wang is

weaving multiple narratives together. By embedding a mini-story within a larger story, he

offers some historical background on traveling doctors and their metal rings. As he

returns to the narrative about the Medicine King and the Tiger, it becomes apparent that

the metal ring plays a key role in the story:

So, the Medicine King told the tiger, “After three days, I will return to cure you. I

need to make a metal ring, so that when you open your mouth, I can stick the ring

in your mouth. When I reach in to pull out the pin, you will feel a lot of pain and

feel a strong urge to clamp down and bite my arm. The ring will protect my arm

from your bite. Once it is in place, I can pull out the pin and apply medicine to

your mouth. For three days, you must wait for me here.” [Mimes the actions of

prying open a mouth and pulling out the pin.] After three days, the Medicine King

finished making a ring and returned to the crossroads to cure the tiger. The tiger

was very grateful and let the Medicine King ride on his back. This is why in

theater performances, one sees the Medicine King sitting on a tiger’s back.

[Gestures to the painting.]

Wang’s narrative here clearly demonstrates a continual interaction with the

painting, through gesturing, pointing, and the inclusion of specific narrative references to

details in the painting. It is evident that Wang draws on a variety of visual cues and

mnemonic elements in the painting while narrating these details in a coherent and

structured story. In a dialectical manner, the painting also guides and confirms Wang’s

evolving narrative as he repeatedly points to the visual evidence. However Wang’s

referencing of the painting does not seem to follow a linear order of fixed temporal

scheme. Instead, Wang’s gesturing to the painting seems spontaneous as he moves fluidly

through his performance. Similarly, the narrative itself seems flexible enough to

accommodate tangential narratives, such as his side commentary on the significance of

the metal ring to traveling doctors. While Wang recounted a story that focuses on the

relationship between the deity and the tiger, the painting depicts the deity holding up a

sharp pin in one hand while tugging on a dragon’s beard with the other. The deity is also

wearing a robe with a frontal view of a dragon’s head. In other stories associated with the

Medicine King, he is said to have cured the Dragon King 􀩃􀺦, the deity of the seas, who

rewarded him with a recipe book of cures, or in certain versions, a treasure chest of

medicines.234 In the painting, the deity appears to be holding an acupuncture needle up to

the dragon above his head, although Wang’s story suggests that it may also be the hairpin

pulled from the tiger’s mouth. These different possibilities reveal the narrative density of

the painting, which clearly bears many potential narratives connected with the figures in

it.

Wang does not mention the deity’s two attendants who are emerging from behind

the deity on either side of him. To the left side of the deity, an attendant carries a gourd

bottle with a red cap, an object associated with healing, protection, and longevity. Gourd

bottles, which were used to mix and hold medicines, also became a shop sign for

apothecaries. The calabash gourd (hulu 􀞰􀩒) depicted here may also serve as a rebus

with the homophone for “protection” (hu 􀞹).235 To the right of the deity, another

attendant carries a medicinal chest, which may be referenced as the reward provided by

the Dragon King. In sum, these details may call up a whole host of other narratives,

including the various myths and stories associated with Sun Simiao’s disciples.236

Interestingly, Wang describes important objects that are not depicted in the

painting. By inserting a brief account of how traveling doctors used a rattling metal ring

to announce their arrival in a populated area, Wang links the painting directly to the

234 In other versions, the Medicine King cures the Dragon King’s son who is disguised as a snake or the

dragon of Kunming Lake. For a synopsis of the tale, see Jeremy Roberts, Chinese Mythology A to Z (New

York: Facts of File, 2004), 140.

235 For a brief discussion of calabash gourds in Chinese art and folklore, see Patricia Welch, Chinese Art: A

Guide to Motifs and visual imagery (Rutland: Tuttle, 2008), 50-52.

236 Sun Simiao’s most famous disciple is Meng Shen 􀫔􁌩 (621-714), a noted alchemist and physician who

authored the Shiliao bencao 􀵊􀨏􀐧􀒤. For a study of Medicine King stories and lore, see Paul Unschuld,

Medicine in China: Historical Artifacts and Images (Munich: Prestal Verlag, 2000).

professional world of traveling doctors. In the story, the metal ring protects the Medicine

King’s hand from the tiger’s teeth. It also allows the doctor to cure his tiger patient and

gain the tiger’s loyal service as his protective steed. The story thus communicates the

powerful efficacy of the ring, to “attract the auspicious and repel the portentous.” For

Wang, this explains the significance of the metal rings carried by traveling doctors in the

non-story world. He further explains how these hollow metal rings serve a practical

function of alerting people of a doctor’s arrival. There is thus a direct correlation between

the efficacious power of the ring and its role in supporting the doctor’s livelihood and the

health of the community. The metal ring also mirrors the role of the Medicine King

image, which according to Wang, is also carried around by traveling doctors to aid in

their work. In an allegorical manner, Wang’s narrative discussion of the metal ring

reflects back on the significance of the painting as an auspicious object.

At the end of his narrative, Wang links his story to practices in the theater

industry, concluding that the story clarifies “why in theater performances, one sees the

Medicine King sitting on a tiger’s back.” This simple conclusion opens up a theatrical

view of the painting, where the central figures are likened to theater performers. In the

Mianzhu region, and especially in Chengdu, the Medicine Deity figures prominently in

ritual theater performances.237 Today, although traveling doctors are rare, the deity’s

birthday is still honored in regional temple festivals, where theater troupes would perform

for the deity and make pleas for the health of the community. In the story, the four-way

crossroads described by Wang is quite reminiscent of a theater stage or outdoor square

(chang 􀓆). Like an established site for ritual theater that is aligned with the four

237 In nearby Zitong county of Sichuan, the Medicine King Gorge 􁀰􀺦􀜡 is now a burgeoning tourist

attraction and monument. Local theater troupes regularly perform dramas based on the Medicine King

figure, locally known as one of four “theater deities” 􀼤􀴪.

directions, the crossroads is at the conjunction of four paths. In the story, the Medicine

King and the tiger meet at the crossroads at the “foot of the mountains,” a liminal site

between the human community and the wild, and between the earthly and the divine

realms. In his performance, Wang recreates and inhabits the liminal space of the

crossroads through gesture and mime. In adopting theatrical conventions, such as the

intonation of different voices, dramatic gestures, miming, and using the stick as a prop,

Wang takes on multiple identities in rapid succession.238

Immediately after concluding this narrative, Wang moves closer to his audience,

shifts his tone of voice to a lower pitch, and offers this painting to me for purchase. His

movements convey the end of the lively storytelling session and a transition to the more

serious business of negotiating a deal. I had not expected the offer to be made so

abruptly, although I knew that sharing oral narratives was a well-established “tool of the

trade” for making a sale. In the context of promoting his works, Wang’s narrative boosts

the prestige of his studio as well as the market value of his works. In this regard, it may

be considered a success since I did indeed purchase the painting and promote it by

including it in this study. According to literary scholar David Rudrum, a performative

view of narrativity requires one to ask whether or not a narrative is “successful”: whether

or not it fulfills its aims in a particular social context. Instead of simply asking how

narratives take on different forms, Rudrum calls on narratologists to question what

narratives “are capable of doing.” 239 In Wang’s case, his performative storytelling may

238 Vibeke Bordahl, The Oral Tradition of Yangzhou Storytelling (Surrey, England: Curzon Press, 1996), 84.

239 David Rudrum, “Narrativity and Performativity: From Cervantes to Star Trek,” in Theorizing

Narrativity, ed. John Pier and Jose Angel Garcia Landa (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2008),

255.

be understood as successfully fulfilling his aims when his works are purchased and

publicized by his visitors, including researchers such as myself.

As an important parallel to Wang’s storytelling, the presentation of performative

gestures also plays a central role in the iconography of the Medicine King and in the

ritual theatre performances of the deity that serve to strengthen and protect the health of

Medicine King followers. In many pictorial depictions, the deity is depicted either seated

or standing over a tiger and holding up a needle to a dragon. This gesture displays the

Medicine King’s mastery over the elemental life forces of yin and yang, where the tiger

below is associated with the yin element and the dragon above with the yang element.

This particular gesture is clearly related to theater performances of the Medicine King, as

documented in a late Qing dynasty print from the northern print center of Yangliuqing

(fig. 49). In this print, the central figure of the Medicine King has one leg holding down

a tiger and another arm outstretched, holding a needle up to a man who is wearing a

dragon costume and standing on a chair. In contrast to Wang’s painting, the print presents

all the details of a theater performance, including the chair that serves as a prop to

indicate the dragon’s movement in the sky.

In the folk art literature, Wang’s painting of the Medicine King would be

categorized as an “altar painting” 􀏃􁈰, distinguished from narrative based ones such as

the Qing example of “theater-based nianhua. ” However, the typologies constructed by

scholars to organize such nianhua works by function or format inevitably conceal their

rich and multifaceted connections in narrative discourse. Through his theatrical

storytelling, Wang actually situates the painting within multiple discourses: the medicine

and healing professions, theater, ritual practices, poetry, and local history. In doing so, he

not only positions himself as an authoritative and experienced narrator, he also

establishes the cultural and social value of the painting on many fronts.

Wang’s storytelling also connects the painting to zhiguai 􁆽􀜯 narratives, often

translated as “records of the anomalies” or “stories of the strange” that were shared in

casual oral storytelling since the fifth century BCE. These stories enjoyed a resurgence of

interest during the Ming and Qing periods and continue to play a role in contemporary

Chinese film, short stories, and popular culture in general.240 Wang’s story is closely

related to the many zhiguai narratives that focus on a prominent tiger character who

exchanges either knowledge or skills with a human. In his study of “righteous tigers” in

zhiguai tales, Charles Hammond describes the tiger as a powerful “archetype of ferocity”

that also embodies the Confucian virtues of righteousness, loyalty, courage, and

generosity. 241 Much like the personality of door deities or demon quellers depicted in

nianhua, tigers are both fearsome and revered.

Wang’s storytelling is not only a rich store of cultural and historical knowledge; it

is also a critical strategy for asserting this knowledge and authority in the marketplace.

To return to the question of what is at stake in acknowledging the embodied repertoires

of nianhua practice, Wang’s narrative illuminates the role of nianhua in realms outside of

the folk art industry, where a painting of a Medicine King might be circulated in homes,

temples, and medicine shops as a ritually efficacious image. In Sichuan, images and

stories of the Medicine King are circulated in Medicine King temples 􁀰􀺦􀫲, where a

240 For a comprehensive history of zhiguai, see Xiaohuan Zhao, Classical Chinese Supernatural Fiction: A

Morphological History (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 2005).

241 Hammond’s study includes many zhiguai narratives that bear strong similarities to Wang’s tale,

including one that recounts a man pulling a bone from a tiger’s throat and another of a man pulling a thorn

from a tiger’s paw. In both cases, the tiger provides a great reward for the human’s kindness and courage.

Charles Hammond, “The Righteous Tiger and the Grateful Lion,” Monumenta Serica, 43 (1996): 191-211.

range of ritual activities takes place to prevent and cure disease. The annual Medicine

King Festival 􁀰􀺦􀟶 and ritual theater performances are also held at the temples, which

serve as important trading and networking venues for those in the traditional healing and

medicinal herb industries. These events have been further advertised as tourist attractions,

especially for urban visitors seeking a more “cultural experience” of rural Sichuan. The

Medicine King Festival of Yunxi 􁄉􀼆 village near the township of Shenfang 􀵉􀙝 is a

particularly popular tourist destination. Painted or printed images of the Medicine King

may serve as important sources of social and cultural capital for these different

communities, where the narrative density of the image may be activated in a variety of

embodied activities, both secular and sacred.

There is also much at stake in recognizing the living and evolving dynamism of

nianhua storytelling. I will briefly give an account here of how a young nianhua

printmaker has developed his own repertoire of gestures and stories for presenting

nianhua to potential customers. During one of my visits to the Chen family workshop in

2006 with Han Gang, we met with Chen Xingcai’s eldest grandson Chen Gang, who was

working as a print apprentice at the time. In addition to carving, printing, and painting

works, Chen Gang was responsible for greeting visitors, taking them on extended tours of

the studio, and for selling works (fig. 50).

Among the many narratives Chen relayed to us, I will include here his discussion

of the Bicycle-riding Maiden 􀰎􀓚􀵢􀭯, a well-known image in the Chen family

repertoire of prints (fig. 69). The topic of the Bicycle-riding Maiden arose when Chen

Gang guided us into the carving area where various tools, half-carved woodblocks, and

print samples were spread around the tables. One of the half-carved blocks on the table

depicted the outline of the Bicycle-riding Maiden. As Chen was explaining the process of

carving, he picked up this block and pointed to the chiseled marks on the block as an

example of “yang carving,” 􁀝􀥙, where the negative space is carved away to leave the

lines protruding out of the block (fig. 51). I then asked Chen if he knew the history of the

image. Here is my translation of his full response, with a record of his gestures in

brackets:

I’ve been making this print for many years now. I believe it is quite old, from

several generations ago. Back in those days, the print designers [􀟂􀴽] imagined

this kind of bicycle for riding and made a picture of it. The handlebars of the

bicycle looks like this. [Points to carved outline on the block.] The artisans from

the past imagined it like this since there weren’t even bicycles back then. Take a

look at what they came up with! [Holds up the block.] They were rural people and

they gave the bicycle a dragon’s head. They completely imagined this. Take a

look at these steel wires; they are all twisty and curvy. [Traces the lines with his

fingers.] I heard all of this from the others. In any case, a master print designer

from the past drew this image according to his imagination, this Bicycle-riding

Maiden [Adds emphasis on the title of the work.] It is even quite famous now. We

all call it the Bicycle-riding Maiden. There are some things that represent

Mianzhu, such as “double-bang firecrackers” [􀶠􀑇]. This print is a representative

work, as it is more famous than the others.242

In this short narrative, Chen Gang explains how rural designers of the past

imagined the fanciful details of the bicycle. To confirm his interpretation, he points to the

auspicious dragonhead and curved wires, repeatedly asking us “to look” and see for

ourselves. These visual markers serve as mnemonic cues for his narrative as well as the

concrete evidence confirming his narrative for his audience. Chen’s narrative can be

242 Chen Gang, in interview with the author, Mianzhu, Sichuan, July 2006.

traced to an interpretation of the print that has been published in folk art research and in

the media, which often repeat this detail that the print designer’s depiction of the bicycle

was based on imagination or hearsay rather than direct observation of an actual bicycle.

However, it is significant that Chen assigns oral origins to the narrative and not written

ones: “I heard all of this from the others.” This simple statement conveys Chen’s selfaware

position as both a receiver and giver of orally transmitted knowledge. While he

does not explicitly state who “the others” are, he is most likely referring to the other

members of the Chen workshop.243 In recognizing the other voices that have shaped and

authorized his telling, Chen performs his own role within an established community of

nianhua makers and speakers.

Chen’s embodied telling takes places in the performative present, recreating the

meaning of the work in his own words and gestures. Caressing the block, Chen

immediately establishes his own personal relationship to it: “I’ve been making this print

for many years now.” This casual opening supports his authority to speak and firmly

locates the print within the Chen family print tradition. He then establishes the age of the

print as being “quite old” and of rural origins, two highly valued features in the folk art

industry as discussed in the introduction of this study. Chen’s gestures and expert

handling of the block are essential forms of non-verbal communication that perform the

value of the block as well as his own embodied skills as a trained apprentice, attesting to

what narratologists have termed “narrative competence,” the acquisition of skills to both

receive and transmit narratives within a social and cultural context.244 Instead of situating

Chen’s story as derivative of folk art publications, it is important to recognize his

243 Later in the conversation, we are told that he has never visited the museum.

244 Emma Kafalenos, Narrative Causalities (Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2006), 2.

embodied telling as a strategic creation in its own right, for the purposes of supporting the

family business. Anthropologist Johannes Fabian reminds ethnographers that talk about

culture “is itself a cultural practice, a rhetorical strategy, and that this is also the case with

(talk about) popular culture.”245

As an experienced speaker in this setting, Chen kept his audience in mind as he

selected specific details to share about the woodblock. As academic researchers and

potential buyers, Han Gang and myself could play a role in boosting the fame and status

of the workshop through our writings, photographs, and purchased works. These factors

may have influenced his decision to focus on the work’s historical value and rural

origins. It is likely that he would take a different approach for another audience. In

keeping in mind the co-creative relationships of narrators and audiences, these interviews

must be approached as delicate inter-subjective exchanges rather than direct

transmissions of cultural knowledge from one individual to another.

There are many historical precedents for such innovative storytelling approaches

in the oral culture of nianhua. For instance, Wang Shucun has commented on orally

transmitted narratives that were innovated to suit the needs of the nianhua industry

during the late Qing period. In his study of door deity prints from Sichuan, Wang records

the following story that was orally disseminated by printshops in Mianzhu:

There was a couple with a wife who had been pregnant for ten months but could

not give birth to the baby. Someone said that if they tore off the head of the door

god and burnt it, the child would have no problem descending from heaven. The

husband believed this so he ripped off the head of the door god, burnt it to ashes

and mixed the ashes into a drink for his wife to consume. When she drank it, the

baby was born. Stories such as a door god’s head helping with a birth are but

245 Johannes Fabian, Anthropology with an Attitude (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), 95.

mystified tales told by print workshops to market their products to a wider

audience. They also reflect the long and complex history behind Mianzhu’s door

god industry.246

According to Wang, sensational stories such as this one were circulated to attract

customers and to propagate new print rituals in order to increase sales and profit. These

examples not only challenge the idea that oral transmissions are static and unchanging,

they demystify them by revealing their pragmatic nature. Although Chen’s story does not

prescribe a ritual practice, it links the workshop prints to a highly valued discourse in the

contemporary print industry - that of folk art research. His storytelling is not only a way

of marketing the workshops’ prints and paintings, it is also a way of claiming authority

over nianhua history and knowledge. In comparing these narratives, it is clear that orally

transmitted stories draw on different discourses to raise the profile of a print workshop

within its immediate environment. As such, orally transmitted narratives can be

understood as bringing auspiciousness in the form of livelihood, prosperity, and social

status. These examples show that nianhua are not only visual texts, but also performative

ones that engage all the senses. Nianhua can thus be considered complex sites of social

engagement and narrative power, playing important roles in “orality, dialogue, life

stories, and community-building or what may be more generally called living history.”247

246 Wang Shucun􀺦􀶎􀕨, Zhongguo menshen hua 􁇏􀝓􀫊􀴪􀟂 [Chinese door deity pictures] (Tianjin: Tianjin

renmin chubanshe, 2004), 42-43.

247 Della Pollock, Remembering: Oral History Performance (Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), 1.

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