Street names don't necessarily come from political celebrities, pop songs, movies or famous stars. Born at the grassroots level, he wandered the streets of Hong Kong, New Territories and Kowloon with his "imperial pen" and childish calligraphy. He is known as "the Emperor of Kowloon" Ceng Zaocai.
The Mystery of Life-Kowloon the Great
Originally named Ceng Zaocai, Kowloon the Great was born in Li Antang Village, Guangdong Province. He/Kloc-came to Hong Kong at the age of 0/6 to work as a worker. Handyman and garbage station worker. Because of an industrial accident, his temperament changed greatly. He claimed that he had read the genealogy at the age of 35 and knew that Kowloon was owned by his ancestors and illegally occupied by the Hong Kong government. Since then, he has been calling himself "the Emperor of Kowloon", scribbling on telephone poles, transformer boxes, mailboxes, pedestrian seats and pavilions on the road. He used a blunt pen and thick ink to write down his repeated genealogy: "Ceng Zaocai, King of Kowloon, was once the Tang Dynasty, Zeng Ronghua ..." to vent his dissatisfaction with the government's "illegal occupation" of his land. In the eyes of modern people, his behavior is "graffiti", but he regards graffiti "genealogy" and "emperor's name" as ancient "declaration of land" to declare sovereignty and recover the family heritage he deserves.
He is a man who is "cautious to the end". He regarded a small temple in the "ancestral land" around Kowloon, Rainbow and Diamond Hill as an ancestral temple. When it is convenient to move, he often comes to worship his ancestors and pray for blessings to show his gratitude. His respect for his ancestors.
The latest situation of "Emperor"
Ceng Zaocai, 84, was admitted to the hospital because of a recurrence of foot disease. After his recovery, under the arrangement of social workers, he moved out of Kwun Tong, where he had lived for nine years, and moved into a Heying Care Center for the Elderly in Xiumaoping. Although he can't doodle everywhere in nursing homes, he will "show his hands" and "hide his hands" on paper.
The prosperity of the emperor
His unique and childlike calligraphy has been "patrolling the ground" for fifty years, leaving "original works" everywhere. Finally, his name is deeply imprinted in the hearts of everyone in Hong Kong, witnessing the rise and fall of Hong Kong.
A few years ago, he began to be appreciated by the outside world. His street calligraphy and graffiti works were exhibited in the 50th Venice Biennale "Emergency Zone" and interviewed by foreign media for many times. He once became the spokesman of a brand detergent, and the advertising theme was very attractive. He used detergent to clean the "true colors" of the "Imperial City" in the streets of Hong Kong to highlight the functions of the product. Finally, because of his well-known "legend" and the ingenious bridge between the advertising production company, the advertisement won the grand prize. His works have also been praised by fashion designer Deng? Wisdom appreciation is printed on fashionable clothes. Also, at the three-day Japanese popular auto show held at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Center in 2002, his "Mo Bao" sat naked in a white private car nicknamed "Emperor Kowloon" and was favored by young people.
"originality" and graffiti
Graffiti and "original works", one of the four elements of Hip pop culture, are also all over the streets. Graffiti is a street culture in Europe and America in 1960s. With the lack of material life and the serious unemployment rate, young people in the slums of new york put their names on the walls to vent their anger and resentment towards society. Soon, this behavior became the trend at that time. As mentioned earlier, the "emperor" was dissatisfied with the invasion of his ancestors' land by the British Hong Kong government, so he often "visited incognito" and scribbled his "emperor's name" and "genealogy" around him to vent his dissatisfaction. Obviously, both of them use graffiti as a channel to express their dissatisfaction. The difference is that the former is a young man's patent and feels very avant-garde, while the latter is the eccentric behavior of an old man who calls himself "the emperor", but it has miraculously become an immortal legend in Hong Kong.
Art or nonsense?
Although graffiti and "original objects" are both acts of destroying animals, from a purely aesthetic point of view, they do have something to appreciate and broaden the boundaries of art. In the early days of graffiti development, graffiti people just wrote a few names on the wall in bold lines. After 1975, they studied the characteristics of color, composition and style, such as a brand-new canned oil-spraying three-dimensional pattern with dazzling colors, clear lines and changeable characters. After years of evolution, graffiti is no longer a prank that destroys the will of animals. Its unique design has attracted the attention of major commercial organizations and become the most fashionable pattern.
Ceng Zaocai's calligraphy was criticized by Zheng Chuxiong in the article "Visual Art Can't tolerate Calligraphy": "The applied creation like Ceng Zaocai, which can only be combined with daily life, is blindly touted, which may be the best performance of vulgarization and superficiality of social art? Yes It is true that his calligraphy deviates from the beauty of lines, the rhyme of strokes and the change of density between words in traditional calligraphy, but does it not belong to art if it does not conform to the traditional aesthetic view?
Liu Shuangyang, an art critic, believes that traditional standards often hinder artistic innovation. Ceng Zaocai's calligraphy has a strong personal style, full of children's naive interest, but it does not lose? Thick touch, rigorous structure. Even calligraphy works? To the level of Wang Xizhi, but due to the lack of personal style, the artistic value of this work is definitely not high. In fact, the word "emperor" is unpretentious, and its frank artistic conception is beyond the reach of calligraphers.
The Chairman of the Film and Media Arts Group of the Hong Kong Arts Development Council also believes that under the quality traditional education, Hong Kong's "stream culture" has been rejected by popular novels, music and cartoons. He also stressed that there is no need to divide the so-called high-quality culture and mass culture across the board. He has been to France and was stunned by the cartoon pattern of the little prince printed on the paper money, which he thought was a sign of attaching importance to popular culture. He believes that our life is surrounded by a large number of high-quality, personalized and distinctive cultures. For example, although Ceng Zaocai's calligraphy is different from traditional calligraphy, we can't deny that it is a part of culture and worth storing, recording or commercializing.
Hong kong story series
He doesn't care whether his Mo Bao is a work of art or not. Seemingly crazy, he risked being sued and "went out on patrol" without change. He just wants to do his bit to show the world where "sovereignty" is.
His Mo Bao changed his life and became a part of Hong Kong legend.
Even if Mo Bao is gradually washed away as he did in detergent advertisements, his simple, careless and casual handwriting will remain in Hong Kong culture and will never be erased.