Meaning, Imagination And Construction

For a long time, anthropologists take art as one of the path for understanding, grasping and researching culture, and probe the relevancy between art and culture via artistic expression. For the author who had received professional training of art, the research of social culture meaning behind it by taking costume art as cultural representation could avoid the limitation caused by talking about art research with art. Therefore, this paper aims at discussing how current designers construct with the imagination for ethnic minorities and costume of ethnic minorities, and their own significance via the participation and observation of current exhibition and performance ethnic minorities costume design, and through the observation and analysis of exhibition and performance ethnic minorities costume art, the culture carrier that combines multi-function of practicality, aesthetics and symbolization. The author mainly analyzed Miao custom design in Xijiang area in the three individual cases of "Love My China" parade formation in60th anniversary celebration of national day in2009, representation of local folk cultural songs and dances in Xijiang area, and external exhibition and performance of ethnological museum from theoretical perspective and method of symbolic anthropology and artistic anthropology, and presented in the narrative form of ethnography.The exhibition and performance ethnic minorities costume in this paper is neither the commercial daily costume consumer product facing to the public nor the acting costume of folk songs and dances used in ordinary variety shows, but the ethnic minorities costume design work that is used to exhibit to the public or for performance purpose (i.e. mass pageant in national day, opening and closing ceremony of Olympic Games, foreign culture communication and performance of ethnic minority costume of ethnographic museum, ethnic minorities culture performance in tourism development of regions inhabited by ethnic groups, etc). It has the diversified design characteristics of representation, politics, artistry and commerce.The forming of affection for exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area by chance triggered author’s thinking about the sameness and difference between this kind of costume and traditional costume created by Miao people, and author’s attempt to understand current Chinese costume design culture from it, thus the original intention for researching the exhibition and performance costume design is formed. After the study of three cases, the author observed the ambiguity interpretation of designers for Miao costume in Xijiang area through the design works of different designers. These cases are the basis for demonstrating the imagination of designers for ethnic minorities and ethnic minorities costume, and meaning construction.The whole paper is divided into three parts:introduction, main body and conclusion.In introduction part, author explained the reasons for selecting this subject at first and then put forward to research the purport of this problem in a further way, namely, in the interpretation of art anthropology of current exhibition and performance Miao costume design in Xijiang area under globalization context, clarify how designers make ambiguity presentation of Miao women’s costume in Xijiang area through active imagination construction of its image. Secondly, the introduction demonstrated the important research value and meaning of researching design art of current exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area in theoretical and practical aspect from the unique point of view of art anthropology, clarified the specific train of thought for research and determined to apply the research method by combining field work with historical text.The main body includes five chapters. In the first chapter, from the five subjects of fashion trend and style, symbol and symbolization, globalization and colonization, imagination and identification, and sex and culture, the author smoothed out the relevant theories and research results of predecessors about ethnic minorities costume, discovered the problems that wait to be researched, that is through "deep description" of design behavior of designers, understand how designers actively demonstrate the explicit and containing concept system, meaning system and emotion pattern of design works with the body wearing costume, meaning for others, and self imagination and construction.Research of context and discussion of the scenes of individual cases are the main contents in the second chapter. On the premise that exhibition and performance costume is defined, author introduced the practical context of "Xijiang" nature of the image of Miao women and the "feminization" of Miao minority in Xijiang area, analyzed why Miao women in Xijiang area and their rich dress become the resources and capital of ethnic minorities culture exhibition and performance, explained the reasons that Miao costume in Xijiang area is pushed to the stage and become the classics and representation of Miao costume, and briefly described the design of current Chinese exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area in individual case scene focused in this paper.In the third chapter, the authored at first given attention to the meaning system in the pattern of Miao women’s traditional rich dress in Xijiang area, analyzed how the costume (pattern), as the "second skin", becomes the carrier for bearing meaning, and demonstrated in the design of exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area, how the meanings of these patterns play function as the factor that restrict designers. Through the transfer of the scenes of three individual cases, the author analyzed the technique of designers in extracting elements from the pattern of traditional rich Miao dress in Xijiang area by taking the fragmentation treatment of tradition Miao costume pattern by designers as the example. At the end of this chapter, the author discussed how designers convey the meanings of these patterns with "significance" in design works, how to understand the symbolic meaning contained in patterns and make innovation and application, and analyzed these new "meanings"(design works) to demonstrate the difference of different social cultural meaning systems and thus identify the reason of meaning transfer."Element collage" design method of the designer of current exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area and the elements that restrict design idea are the contents that will be especially demonstrated in the fourth chapter of this paper. Through the collage design behavior of designers, the author analyzed the collage path, subjective and objective restraining factors and collage difference of different designers during design process, and deeply described how current Chinese exhibition and performance traditional ethnic minorities costume designers actively convey and share concept system, meaning system and emotion pattern with wearers and watchers through the body wearing symbol and symbolization. The author discussed when facing to the inheritance and extension of traditional resources, how the designers transform themselves and construct identification to highlight ethnic minorities characteristics, and dig out the subjective design intents that hide behind details.In the last chapter of main body, it is mainly introduced that in the design of exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area, how designers transform the image of Miao minority in Xijiang area in the mind to the design works in real world in accordance with subject restriction and contents requirements of performance activities. The author disclosed the reasons for designer to reconstruct "tradition" by analyzing the problem such as how designers present their own inspiration sources soundly to the exhibition and performance stage, how to reflect their own personal style between the struggle of "similar or not" and "yes or no", and how to present the discrepancy between Miao "tradition" in Xijiang area and "modern" of design, and how the designers present the ambiguity of design works through multiple imagination results of Miao minority by depending on the multiple meaning communication platform of exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area.In conclusion part, the author made side note for current Chinese exhibition and performance Miao costume in Xijiang area with globalization as the background. The research showed in current construction atmosphere that ethnic minorities are "feminized", the designers designed exhibition and performance Miao women’s costume and constructed their own meaning expression with Miao women in Xijiang area and the rich dress that reflects high value sense as the medium, and their imagination for ethnic minorities. In the globalization context, the designers presented "traditional" and numerous complicated states through the reconstruction of "tradition". In the practical process of this culture heritage, the meaning constructed by designers is ambiguous. This kind of ambiguity is the result of multiple imagination of design for Miao minority. The designers complete self-fulfillment in the construction of meaning and imagination.