Chen Run: The Power of Puppets

发布时间：2025-06-02 23:11:29

原标题：Chen Run: The Power of Puppets

The Hainan Puppet Show is listed as a national cultural heritage art. The Puppet Show began to be performed in Hainan during the Yuan Dynasty period and has been popular in Sanjiang Town, Haikou for more than 600 years.

Today we are thrilled to introduce you to a young man born in the 2000’s - Chen Run. He’s formed a deep bond with the ancient art of the Sanjiang Puppet Show.

Chen Run hails from Luodou Farm, Zhulian Village, Wenchang. As a child, whenever a puppet show stage appeared in front of the village temple, he was sure to be in the audience. When he was four or five, he would climb up onto the props box and watch the whole show with rapt attention. This obsession with puppeteering destined Chen to a lifelong association with the traditional folk art.

Feng Hai, a province level intangible cultural heritage representative of the Sanjiang Puppet Show art put his heart and soul into teaching Chen. From then on, the youngster’s winter and summer vacations were dedicated to the puppet show. Performing with different troupes in different locations, he learned to sing the operas, move the puppets, and also how to play many of the musical instruments that accompany the show.

During his college years, Chen Run had a lot of creative ideas. He combined puppet shows with tourism, designing a unique travel route and winning first prize in a travel route design competition.

After graduating, Chen didn’t look for a comfortable white color job, but instead threw himself fully into keeping the art of the puppet show alive.

Chen’s performance calendar is full of bookings and his singing style and puppetry skills are maturing. Despite facing the many problems that reality often imposes on the life of an artist, including an unstable income, he’s never considered giving up. As he believes deeply in the inexhaustible power of traditional culture, Chen is convinced that as long as the art of the Puppet Show is honored and passed down lovingly to the next generation, it will continue to shine a bright light in even the darkest hour.