What cosplay is like in China, where home-grown heroes thrive, ‘play’ is emphasised and it’s not all about copying
- China’s cosplay market is uniquely open to interpretation due to its isolation behind the Great Firewall
- The practice itself has a profound effect on the identities of ‘cosers’, as they combine their own sense of self with the personalities and values of fictional characters
Cosplay is a portmanteau of costume and play, and the first recorded instances of cosplay were in 1908 in Cincinnati, Ohio, the US, and in 1910 in Tacoma, Washington.
Two fans of Mr Skygack, the world’s first sci-fi comic, both dressed up as the strip’s protagonist, an alien anthropologist, to attend “masked parties”. But unlike Halloween, a costume for a “coser” is not relegated to one day per year and then disposed of.
However accepted and even celebrated a coser’s efforts may be on Halloween, the practice has never really been considered fashion, as it simply replicates designs, details and demeanours from fictional and historical figures.
But surprisingly, cosplay and fashion do share a number of similarities: they are both second skins, they are both kinds of performance art, and in China they both developed around the same time.
The world of cosplay, in China in particular, stems primarily from ACG, which stands for anime, comic and games. One game alone, League of Legends, was compelling enough for Louis Vuitton to partner with game developer Riot Games to design a trophy travel case, unique champion skins, “digital assets”, and even a capsule collection.
