Bamboo Shed for Chaozhou community Yu Len Festivals
潮籍盂蘭盆會竹戲棚
0, Streetscapes, Landscapes & Infrastructural Facilities 街貌、景觀及基礎建設
Yu Len Festival is held in every July of the Lunar Calendar. Chaozhou people who live in Hong Kong will gather funds to build large-scale bamboo sheds to host Chinese opera for over a month to praise the charitable and pious deeds of the deities. Ordinary bamboo shed is around 20-30 meters wide, 40-50 meters long and 6-8 meters tall, dependent on the size of the site. Bamboo is a traditional architectural material in Chinese culture. It is light, pliable and bendable, hence bamboo structures are both stable and flexible. It can be altered into different forms and is easy to construct and dismantle. Bamboo structures vividly demonstrate the beauty of building dynamics, manifesting the exquisiteness and wisdom in traditional Chinese architecture. Yu Len Festival was declared one of the items under batch 3 of China Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2011.
盂蘭盆會在每年農曆七月進行，旅港潮藉人仕多會集資建造大型竹戲棚，並連續一個多月上演神功戲，旨在人神共聚，同時酬謝神恩。一般竹柵由二丶三十米寛至四五十米長，高約六至八米，按棚址而定。其實以竹作為建築結構有著深厚傳統，竹枝輕便但柔韌性和拉張力極好，因此搭建起來的竹棚整體結構穩定性十分高，更可以建成不同的型態和模樣，同時易建易拆。竹棚結構更能展示力學之美，處處表現中國建築的優秀傳統及智慧。而香港的盂蘭盆會在2011 年更被列入第三批，《國家級非物質文化遺產名錄》之中，可見其意義重大！
文及攝影：吳啟聰 (香港註冊建築師)
http://www.etnet.com.hk/www/tc/diva/art_hkac_detail.php?id=29114&page=1
