Electric Power Revitalizes Intangible Cultural Heritage, Breathing New Life into a Millennium-old Art

Recently, Taishun's national intangible cultural heritage—Gunpowder-Driven Puppetry — made a stunning appearance on CCTV-1, sparking widespread discussion on social media. Hailing from Taishun, Wenzhou, this unique art form, also known as "Qionghua Puppet Show", combines pyrotechnics with puppet performance. It was included in the first batch of China's National Intangible Cultural Heritage List in 2006, embodying a complex integration of gunpowder craftsmanship, woodworking, papier-mâché, and mechanical design. Traditionally, Medicine-Fired Puppetry Show relied on gunpowder for power, which is classified as an explosive material and poses significant safety risks. This made its dissemination and display extremely difficult, placing the tradition at risk of disappearing.

To preserve and revitalize this heritage, Taishun's Medicine-Fired Puppetry has been innovatively upgraded with an electrical automated control system, electronic ignition, and cold flame technology. Replacing traditional gunpowder with smokeless, odorless electronic cold-flame effects, the upgraded show is less affected by weather conditions, features modular, easy-to-assemble support structures, and is suitable for various performance scenarios. This transformation has achieved a safe, controllable, and standardized operation of the intangible cultural heritage, allowing the Medicine-Fired Puppetry Show to enter more public venues.

Moreover, the automatic circuit control system accurately links puppet movements, firework light effects, and soundtrack rhythms with millisecond-level synchronization, perfectly recreating the magical scene of "puppets flying as flames rise" in every performance. This enhancement has significantly boosted the art form's appeal and shareability.

On short-video platforms, the magical scenes of gunpowder-driven puppets have captivated global audiences with their striking visuals. Related clips have gone viral on YouTube and TikTok, accumulating a total of 230 million views. This stunning art form from China has allowed the world to appreciate the charm of Chinese civilization, ignited emotional resonance for "intangible cultural heritage aesthetics" among young people, and enabled this thousand-year-old art to reach audiences around the world, winning love and recognition from people around the world.