Healing Art, Martial Art, or Fine Art?

Taijiquan is as much an art as it is martial. Performances of solo and paired routines are often beautiful and mesmerising - simultaneously relaxing and compelling. Music is often used in practice and in performance to great effect. It seems that every year a new demonstration pushes the boundaries of the art and creates something new.


An example of this is "Tai Chi in Performance", a video of a live performance featuring Master Sam Masich and his students performing classical Yang style tai chi solo, two person, empty-hand and weapons routines, as well as push hands, qigong, and sparring (both choreographed and improvised) accompanied by live jazz and world music.

Styles

Most styles of taijiquan are named for the person or family who developed them. Here is a list of some of the more important styles and their creators:
Chen style (Chen Wangting)
Yang style (Yang Luchan)
Wu/Hao style (Wu Yuxiang)
Wu style
(Wu Quanyou / Wu Jianquan)
Sun style (Sun Luntan)
Zhaobao style
(developed in the town of Zhaobao)



TAI CHI IN FICTION
Wǔxiá is a Chinese martial literary form that features stories of Chinese "knights errant". Tai chi masters are among the heros (and sometimes villains) of these novels. Movies based on such stories are also popular in China. In the West, Wuxia movies are less popular, but versions of them sometimes make it into the mainstream. Examples of movies that have had success in the West and feature tai chi heroes include "Twin Warriors" (aka "Tai Chi Master" or "Taiji Zhang Sanfeng" 太極張三豐 ) - an account of the mythical founder of tai chi chuan. And the hit Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon by director Ang Lee.

When tai chi appears in western movies it is usually only in the form of people practising forms in the background.
There are some exeptions:

• Patrick Swayze did tai chi in Road House (1989)
• Keanu Reeves learned Chen Style Tai Chi for The Matrix Reloaded (2003) and The Matrix Revolutions (2003)
• Ang Lee's first western film, "Pushing Hands", tells the story of an elderly Chinese Tai Chi Master trying to fit in with western culture in New York State. It features a tai chi fight scene that should be in every tai chi teacher's library due to its clear demonstration of the eight fundamental methods of tai chi.