FredoDreamWork: 2010

The Chinese lantern originated as an improvement over the more simple, more natural – and surely, more widespread – source of lighting: the open flame. The lamp/ lantern shade of course protects the flame inside from being extinguished in windy weather, but it also provides a better, more diffuse form of illumination than an open flame, the latter of which creates sharp contrasts between illuminated and non-illuminated parts of objects. Once created, however, it was inevitable that the lantern shade would be the object of artistic expression, most especially given the highly developed Chinese penchant for artistic embellishment, as any student of Chinese culture will know.

Today the Chinese lantern is used in festivals, especially in Lunar New Year, Mid Autumn Festival and Lantern Festival. During these events, streets in big cities and small towns are decorated with red lanterns. Best places to view lanterns during the aforementioned festivals include Beijing, Hong Kong and Nanjing. In Beijing, temple fairs are held in various venues of the cities where red lanterns hangs everywhere around these venues.

Not only was the Chinese lantern the object of artistic embellishment, it also underwent extensive design experimentation – again, as the result of the encouragement of Chinese society (ancient Chinese society was much more multi-layered, especially after the advent of Confucianism, than outsiders unfamiliar with Chinese cultural history tend to believe): lamp-shade artisans competed among themselves to produce lamp shades of exquisite beauty, both in terms of functionality, design and artistic embellishment. No one encouraged these artisans more heartily than the emperor himself, who of course commandeered the best lamp-shade artisans in the empire to work for him (such recognition was naturally the supreme honor for any artist/ artisan).

While the earliest Chinese lanterns were created for use in the home and for use as entrance-way lighting (which, as all human endeavors, eventually became a status symbol, just as the gate to a housing compound (viz. the Siheyuan compound typical of Beijing, but seen elsewhere in China) eventually became highly ornamental for the same reasons), it was quickly discovered that the lantern made an excellent "flashlight", or portable lighting medium. Historical experts believe that the first such "flashlight" was in fact the Chinese lantern.

These same historical experts also believe that the very concept of street lighting that eventually emerged in Europe stems from European contact with Imperial China, where "street lighting", in the form of the Chinese lantern hanging on doors and gateways, had long since existed, not, perhaps, as a governmental measure but as a natural part of Chinese society (some of mankind's greatest inventions stem from ancient China, including the first widespread use of paper as we know it today (ancient Egyptian papyrus is grossly inferior to the paper developed in China, which, in contrast, resembles modern forms of paper) as well as the use of paper money as a convenient substitute for carrying gold, silver, etc.).

Typical also for ancient Chinese society was its penchant for grand celebrations, where the artistic expression of the individual was harnessed for the common good. One such celebration is the Lantern Festival, aka Little New Year, in recognition of the fact that it is the culmination of the Chinese New Year festival. Just as in the Carnaval do Rio de Janeiro, where contestants compete each year for the award for having created the most impressive costume, contestants in the ancient Lantern Festival competed each year for the award for having produced the most impressive lantern, the difference being that the best lantern designs in China – except for those reserved for the Imperial Palace – became public property: they were copied by every other lamp-shade artisan throughout the country.

The comparison to Carnaval do Rio de Janeiro does not do justice to similar ancient Chinese celebrations, since ancient Chinese celebrations always contained an element of literary allusion and/or reference to other artistic genres such as the fine art of calligraphy. For example, a famous contemporary Chinese poet might compose a poem for the celebration in question in which the poet recognized the artistic achievement of the competing artists/ artisans (lamp-shade artisans, etc.), and occasionally the fame of such a poem would eventually completely overshadow the fame of the artists/ artisans who were the subject of the poem.

Though there is no longer a practical rationale for the Chinese lantern (modern lighting is far superior to the old-fashioned oil lamp), the Chinese lantern is still made – and used and enjoyed! – by Chinese people, including by the Chinese diaspora, but it is also made, used and enjoyed by peoples everywhere, as the Chinese lantern continues to be a vehicle for personal artistic expression, both in terms of functionality, design and embellishment.