In the 1980s and 1990s, when night fell, Hong Kong was just beginning to shine as the Pearl of the Orient. The cascading neon lights can’t illuminate the night, but they cast colors on the people who are running.
In the best era of the city, neon lights light up every night full of energy, light up every wonderful encounter, and at the same time warn you: you better be careful, if you are not careful, you will fall into the abyss.
If any city can be defined by one kind of light, it is only Hong Kong.
Here, all the street lights and car lights are eclipsed, only the colorful neon lights up people’s hearts, instead of all language telling you “this is Hong Kong”.
“Chong qing Forest”
“Fallen Angel”
“2046”
“Mongkok Carmen”
There was the biggest neon sign in the 1970s, and the neon lights lit here after the war symbolized the prosperity of the city.
From the street to the end of the street, the 3D scene seems to be compressed into a piece of A4 paper. If your neon sign hides behind other people’s lights, it will have no meaning to light up. No matter how big or small, every store is competing for this piece of paper. a place in.
In such a heyday, there were more than 100 benders in Hong Kong, but none of them had to worry about running out of business or food and drink. As long as you get to work, there is no end to the order.
But now in Hong Kong, there are less than 10 full-time bending specialists left. The 70-year-old Master Tang Guoxiang is one of the witnesses of Neon’s prosperity and disappearance.
His most proud work is the signboard of the China Merchants Group at the Hong Kong-Macau Ferry Terminal in Central. This signboard, 20 feet high and more than 100 feet long, overlooked the time of the city, as if guarding the prosperity here for him.
In the 1860s, Tang Guoxiang, who had not finished middle school, became obsessed with neon lights. Unable to extricate himself, at the age of 18, he decided to learn the production of neon signs.
To make a neon sign, the first step is to start from the shape, and to draw a feasible manuscript according to the requirements of the customer is a step that lays the foundation for everything. The font, the way the lights are lit, the size and the shape all have a lot to do with it.
Common Chinese fonts in neon signs (from left to right): block script, Northern Wei regular script, official script, printed Song script 
Single hook method, double hook method, double hook plus center line, single hook plus multiple center lines, parallel lines
The streets of Hong Kong at night are awakened by these various designs.
After printing out the actual size drawings, the shape of the neon tube began. Use a lighter to light the special burner, burn the joints of the glass tube to make it soft and plastic, and then shape it according to the drawing.
neon manuscript
The duration of firing and the timing of bending can only be controlled by experience. For Master Tang, this is already a trivial matter. Those lighting designs of various shapes gradually took shape under his hands.
Connect the electrodes, create a vacuum environment, rush into the rare gas, and when the neon light turns on, a work of art is born.
Craftsmen, teachers from different schools, don’t say anything, just let you observe for yourself. Sometimes I watch the master bend the glass tube three or two times, but I can’t keep up with it. It’s either too close to the fire or too soft.
After 3 years of bumpy apprenticeship, he started his career as a neon craftsman, and it took him 50 years to do it.
Fragile glass, fiery flame, his friendship with the two lasted for half a century. Even if they had begun to fail to keep up with the times, he never thought of giving up.
Master Tang is different from other masters. He has a deeper understanding of making neon lights than anyone else. He knows what it is and why it is. The lighting principle, the reason for the failure, he will think carefully.
It is precisely because of this craftsmanship that he received an order of 410,000 yuan as early as 1992, and went to Saipan to install neon lights. The order payment of more than 1 million yuan could not be recovered, and he never talked about it. complain.
If a worker wants to do a good job, he must first sharpen his tools. There is always something that is not suitable for him. He will work hard to study the composition and principle of the tools, and then transform them into the most easy-to-use state.
At that time, there were only 3 apprentices in his studio, but he changed 50 hand fires (tools used to burn glass tubes) to give to his colleagues. Master Tang didn’t think that this would increase competition and benefit others and hurt himself. He just wanted everyone to be able to use good tools and not have to leave work with sore arms.
He loves neon with all his heart and hopes that more people will fall in love with it.
What he misses most is the time when he was 43 years old and had more than 20 apprentices. When we were rushing to order together, I turned on the radio, and the hoarse Cantonese opera came from the radio, and everyone couldn’t help humming.
When you want to go out to climb the mountain, you can be a little headstrong and hand over the order to the apprentices.
But the emergence of LEDs gradually replaced neon lights, and fewer and fewer orders were placed in factories. About 3,000 neon lights are now removed every year. Even the beef signboard, the most representative western restaurant in the western district, was not spared.
Master Tang himself has also dismantled dozens of neon lights with great sadness.
Under such circumstances, more than 20 apprentices began to gradually change careers. Master Tang doesn’t blame anyone, life is not easy for anyone.
And now, he only has a nominal apprentice left, and he doesn’t often go to the stall to study. If you can’t support yourself and your family’s craft, who wants to stick to it?
Although Master Tang is distressed by the passing of neon lights, he has already seen the law of world affairs through the lights. No one will grow old, nothing will become obsolete, and nothing will not be replaced.
Neon lights have accompanied Hong Kong through a good time; he has dedicated his best years to colorful neon lights, which is enough.
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