一幅珍贵的清妓老照片（图）

这是一幅清代青楼女子的珍贵照片，最显著的标志就是她头上的头饰，叫“兜勒”，一般用珍珠镶串而成后，做成各种花式戴在盘发髻的头顶上。再就是她穿着衣服的高领，清代时髦女子的衣领高可及腮，后来随年代的推移逐渐变低。中国上海图书馆藏有类似的一张，但是侧面像，又是黑白照片，因此脸上的妆看不清楚。而我这张不仅是手工着色，而且是七分側面，脸上的妆看的十分清晰，最关键的是眉毛。所谓浓妆，就是先要把脸上的所有汗毛、眉毛全部拔掉，不能像男人那样用刀刮，因为刮掉的毛留着根，长出来的毛又粗又黑。所谓拔其实是绞，就是用两根棉纱线，中间穿个飞轮，双手一紧一松地拉动棉纱线两头，使飞轮一会儿正、一会儿反地飞快转动，两根棉纱线也就跟着来回滚动，再将来回滚动的棉纱线慢慢贴近脸面和双眉，汗毛和眉毛就会被缠绕在棉纱线里连根绞掉，非常疼痛，一个人自己是很难操作的，一般要请身边的姐妹帮忙。等把脸上所有的毛全绞光了，整个脸就像个鸭蛋一样光净。每天早上起床，都要花很长时间化妆，先要洗脸、扑底粉，再画眉毛、抹胭脂、印口红，早年女人的口红不是用唇膏抹在唇上的，而是用专门的染红的纸，双唇用舌尖添湿后夹住红纸印上去的。

这幅照片的拍摄时间大约是1860年广州刚开埠不久，蛋白相纸印晒制作。尤为珍稀的是这张照片的衣领边上描了很精细的金边，衣服上描了20多朵银色的梅花。一丝不苟、笔笔如蚕丝般细，非一般画匠所能为之。时隔近150年，在阳光反射下仍闪闪发光。这样的手工着色照片在国外我相信是没有的，所以我视她为镇宅之宝。

 

  This is a precious photograph of a whore in the Qing dynasty. The most outstanding sign is her hair ornament, which is called doule, made of pearls strung together in different styles and worn on the bob. Besides her collar is high, the collars of women’s clothes in the Qing dynasty used to be as high as to the cheeks and became lower as time went by. Shanghai Library of China has a similar photograph but it is a black-and-white profile therefore we cannot see cosmetics on the face clearly. But my collection is not only colored by hand, but also a seven-tenths image so the cosmetics on the face is quite clear. The eyebrows are the most important. The first step for so-called “raddled” makeup was to pull out all the fine hair and eyebrows on the face, they could not be shaved by razor that men used, for the roots of shaved hair remained and would grow thicker and blacker. To “pull out” is actually to wring, that is, to have two pieces of yarn passed through a flywheel, to drag both the ends of the yarn out tightly then loosely and repeat likewise so that the flywheel rotated quickly clockwise and anticlockwise alternatively and the yarn moved to and fro. Make the yarn close to the face in order to tangle fine hair and eyebrows and pull them out with roots. It was very painful and could not be done for a woman herself, her close sisters’ help was usually needed. When all the fine hair and eyebrows were rooted out, the whole face was as glossy as duck’s egg. Every morning she spent much time putting on makeup: washing her face, putting on foundation make-up, drawing eyebrows and putting on rouge. In those days women did not have lipstick, they used s kind of dyed red paper instead, the lips were licked wet then the red paper was placed between them to make them dyed.

  This photograph was taken around 1860 soon after Guangzhou opened its door to the world and it was printed by sunlight with protein paper. Moreover it is rare for this photograph that meticulous golden border was drawn at the edge of the collar and more than twenty silvery flowers were drawn on the clothes. All was carefully drawn, every stroke is as fine as the silk of silkworms; it could not be drawn by an ordinary artist. After nearly 150 years it still shines in the sun. I am confident that there is not such a photograph colored by hand outside China, so I regard it as a great treasure.

 

 

 

作者：激活自己