In November 2014, Kung Fu Tai Chi publisher Gigi Oh was invited to join over 250 members at the 2nd World Wu Yihui Liuhe Bafa Quan Conference (吳翼翬六合八法拳國際聯盟) held at the Gladden Hotel in Dongguan, Guangdong Province, in China. Grandmaster Wu Yinghua (吴英華), the son of the founder of this lineage, Grandmaster Wu Yihui (1887–1958), is the cover master for our MAR+APR 2015 issue. Gigi had the opportunity to interview Grandmaster Wu at length. He discussed many topics beyond the scope of the cover story. Among them were the problems he saw with the state of martial arts within the People’s Republic of China today. The following discussion was directly from Grandmaster Wu, translated from Mandarin.
The Three Faults According to Grandmaster Wu Yinghua
“Due to poor economic conditions, the government had no ability to promote martial arts. Prior to Deng Xiaoping's reformations in 1976, Chinese martial arts were classified to the lower level of society and as part of the Black Five [The Black Five were considered enemies of the Cultural Revolution: Anti-revolutionaries, Bad Elements, Landlords, Rich Farmers and Rightists –ed.]
“In recent years, a government-advocated slogan propounded the idea that “Wushu belong to sports but above sports.” Institutionally speaking, martial arts is a division of sports. As to “Wushu above sports,” this acknowledges the long history of martial arts and martial culture. But I think in reality that the degree of attention given to Wushu versus sports does not necessarily match with the slogan above. The overall quality of Wushu is low and it has not been properly regulated. There are three major faults in Wushu development today.
“The first fault is that Wushu has transformed into dance (舞蹈化) and artistic play (艺术化). Too many dance moves and artsy elements have been added into Wushu. Since the beginning of the nineties, the Central People’s Broadcasting Station launched a series of programs called “Shenyun (神韵)” such as Taiji Shenyun, Bagua Shenyun and Shaolin Shenyun. Shenyun means ‘performance’. Taiji Shenyun is a Taiji dramatic play which adds dance with Taiji to perform on stage. It often loses the connection with martial arts. In addition to dancing like Taiji, it’s also artsy like Taiji. In the past, the action stars were martial arts experts like Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee and Jet Li. But lately, stars like Zhang Ziyi and Cecilia Zhang are actors without martial backgrounds. They can also fly in the air and walk on walls in the movies. Bagua masters can run all over the stage, not along the Bagua circle. I think this is sad for the martial arts.
“Foreigners come to China in search of the quintessence of Chinese martial arts. Instead, they find modern Wushu that looks like performing arts. I’ve made recommendations to the China Sports Center, Chinese Wushu Institute and the State Sports General Administration Bureau to pay attention to this situation. We need the upper-level leaders to set a correct course to save the future of traditional Chinese martial arts. To make a joke of it, maybe someday the Dance Association will protest or sue the Wushu Association for crossing the line over into their field.
“The second fault is what I call the three excesses. There are too many masters, too many authentic successors and disciples and too many people saying ‘I am number one.’ These excesses are also the main reasons why Wushu development is behind other sports. A person calls himself a master only after training for a short period of time, which is the ‘feel good about themselves’ syndrome. They list many titles of authentic disciples of different systems on their business cards. How can a person master more than ten different systems in a lifetime? A person will stop learning when he or she thinks that they are ‘number one’. Such people cannot learn. They can’t have an open mind. And sadly, they cannot improve anymore. So most of the Wushu practitioners stay in a ‘flowery fists, embroidered legs (花拳绣腿)’ stage. Any style they learn only shows the outside moves without any inner substance. Unfortunately, this also happens in our own system. Without the know of the essence of a system, how can anyone become a master of that style. They can only be called zajia (杂家 literally ‘mixed family’, the equivalent of chop suey), not an master, not zhuanjia (专家 ‘sole possessor family’). My father learned different styles of Kung Fu but only after he reached the age of sixty was he able to weed out the unnecessariness and keep all the essences for Wu Yihui Huayue Xinyi Liuhe Bafa Quan.
“For example, if a kid likes to draw, the parents might send him or her to learn drawing. It will help that kid become a master painter. But if the parent sends the kid to learn dance, music, drawing, chemistry, physics and all sorts of other stuff, they might think that it is better but the chance of this kid becoming a true master in any field is very slim. Nowadays, many so-called masters list themselves as experts in Buddhism, Daoism, Christianity and such on their business cards too. I would hesitate to send my kid to learn from such people.
“I met Grandmaster Cai Longyun (蔡龙云) in Nanling not long ago. I called him with his respectful title of ‘Wulin Leading Authority (武林泰斗)’. Grandmaster Cai quickly corrected me. ‘Please don’t call me this,’ he said. ‘I did not give myself this title. It was other people who bestowed it upon me and I don’t feel I deserve it.’ A Wushu pioneer that has achieved in both the scholarly and martial fields like Grandmaster Cai is so modest. It was such a contrast to these new masters who try to learn as many different styles as possible and quickly forget their former teacher’s names.
“The third fault is unfair judging. Can traditional Chinese martial arts use a scientific grading system? The different traditional schools each have different fist methods and fighting techniques. The only way you can grade them is based on basic theory and method. Often, even within the same system, the external movements differ between individual masters.
“Today in the world of Wushu competition, the 4th place winner is equivalent to the 1st place champion. Why is that? It’s because the Grandmaster’s disciple needs to be placed first. The disciples of the major sponsors and hosts need to be place high on the podium as well. Therefore, the 4th place winner could very well be the top athlete. So some of the elder martial practitioners are no longer interested in participating in competitions. Unfair judging is unhealthy. It’s the black killing hand for Chinese martial arts.
