china urban

The Empress Dowager Cixi and the Breakdown of the Panopticon

2009-11-17T00:29:00.000-08:00

The body of photographs commissioned by the Empress Dowager Cixi are unique amongst Chinese imperial portraits because they weren’t of a private nature (for instance, the book of the Yongzheng Emperor’s masquerade portraits) – though they weren’t necessarily made with the Chinese public in mind, they were meant for display in various hallways of the Forbidden City and for exhibition at world fairs. At the same time, in the aftermath of the Boxer Rebellion, portions of the Forbidden City began opening up to the public. For the first time in history, the people of China were able to gain access to a space and put a face to a previously unseen, panoptic force at Beijing’s centre that ruled over a vast and now tottering empire. In studying the intersection between the Empress Dowager’s portraits and the Forbidden City as a general structure, I hope to discover what happens when a panoptically arranged space breaks down and suddenly the subjects are able to see that which has been watching them. Furthermore, how is it significant that the largest audience to see renderings of this ruling force were foreigners?

Sorry Guys, I have the flu

2009-11-16T11:49:00.000-08:00

My questions/points for Salim's Project:

Have you considered what both of these curved structures mean in a city build on graphs and modules?

There are five Golden River Bridges right? Maybe something about unity (the red ribbon) and multiplicity.

Maybe contrast the Golden River Bridge’s association with grand events and the Red Ribbon’s emphasis on minimal human interference.

The idea of the public in both of these spaces. One is meant to be all inclusive to the public, one is meant to systematically exclude people

2009-11-08T22:26:00.000-08:00

Chen Shun-chu's Family Parade installation and Qingyun Ma's Father's House both engage with issues of heritage, location and biography in a concrete, structural way. Using architectural elements, they strive to connect the past and the present. I will attempt to explore how do these portrayals of history and location differ. Chen Shun-chu places photographs of his family members on the abandoned buildings of his ancestral village in Taiwan. Qingyun Ma built a modern house using traditional inspiration for his father. They both engage with traditional architecture through ruins or traditional building methods, and employ a sense of collection and stacking. The framed photographs seem to enforce the structure, as the stones from Jade Valley enforce the walls of Father's House. Both the photographs and the stones were collected from the past, hoarded as examples of familial ties and traditional heritage. The artists seem to seek to tie themselves directly to the land, to their origin points in the villages of their fathers. Both artists do not reside in the villages where they've created their works, and approach the land as someone with a familial connection, an outsider looking in. How in this way do they engage traditional methods from a modern standpoint? What does it mean for Chen Shun-chu, a Taiwanese artist, to create art about displacement and his heritage as compared to Qingyun Ma's return to his father's ancestral village as a Chinese expatriate?

The Opening Ceremonies, Architecture, and the Cultural Past

2009-11-08T21:56:00.000-08:00

The Beijing opening ceremonies lasted 4 hours, cost over 100 million dollars to produce, featured 15,000 performers, and was attended by over 100 heads of state or royalty. It was created to be, and has since be called, the greatest opening ceremony ever. The two most prominent thematic features of the ceremony were its referencing of Chinese art and culture, and its blending of advanced technology with more traditional motifs. Furthermore, the ceremony was intimately connected with the building in which it took place. Architects Jaques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron have described it as an "anti-monumental" structure and a "collective building", but how exactly is this communicated? How is structure different from the structures in Tienanmen Square that were, likewise, built for and dedicated to the public? How does the change in public architecture reflect change in the Communist Party or the people of China?

On the other hand, the Olympic torch played as important a role in the opening ceremonies as the stadium, especially in terms of the themes outlined above. The torch itself, which was designed by a team from the Lenovo Group (the largest sellers of PCs in China), not only represents traditional Chinese culture and its modern intersection with high technology, but also embodies the globalization inherent in the Olympic Games. To light the cauldron, one of the most famous athletes in China, Li Ning, was suspended high above the stadium as pictures of the torch's journey were projected behind him. After "running" around the entirety of the stadium Li Ning lit the fuse to the cauldron as the final three pictures were displayed. They were the last three places that the torch went before coming to the stadium: Tienanmen Gate, Mao's Mausoleum, and The Monument to the People's heroes. Why would the organizers chose these places as the last stops on the global tour? What did these images, in tandem with the most ideologically charged object of the whole ceremony, as well as the building itself, attempt to say about contemporary Chinese culture, the communist party, and the relationship those two have with the country's recent past? How is Chinese government trying to portray itself not only to the people it governs, but to the entire world?

Identity and Illusion

2009-11-08T21:42:00.000-08:00

In an analysis of the album of costume portraits of the Yongzheng emperor and the Juanqin zhai, (Lodge for Retiring from Hard Work) I hope to investigate the relationship between the manipulation of identity and space through painted illusion. Both the portrait album and the Lodge for Retiring from Hard Work employ elements of masquerade to convey some idea or concept of imperial power. I am interested in the differences that arise when this strategy is applied to a small, personal object as well as a space built for a specifically preformative, public purpose.

When we discussed the portrait album in class, the question I kept asking myself was why this album exists in the first place. Considering the fact that imperial visage portraiture had such a concrete and important public function in this era of the Forbidden City, the production of a album of portraits depicting the only person who was ever intended to view it seemed very odd to me. Obviously, issues and questions of imperial identity are central to answering this question. While all the official visage portraiture from this era is quite formulaic in its emphasis on inexpressive, frontal depictions of the emperor in traditional Manchu dress, the album portraits show the Yongzheng emperor in a variety of costumes and active situations.It follows to then to link these series of portraits with a desire establish oneself as a capable ruler, one who is equally competent in a variety of costumes and settings. However, this reading of the images becomes problematic when we remember that these pictures were not dispersed as were the imperial visage portraits. Rather, these were only for private contemplation and enjoyment of the emperor himself. Therefore, these pictures are more in line with the masquerade culture of Western Europe than the tradition of imperial propaganda. However, there are many questions that still remain: why would the emperor want to engage in a pictorial masquerade with himself? In what ways do these masquerade portraits comment upon Yongzheng's conception of himself as a ruler?

While the album portraits are an interesting example of pictorial illusion for a manipulation of identity, the murals of the Lodge of Retiring from Hard Work present an interesting example of pictorial illusion as a manipulation of space. This issue becomes even more interesting when we take into account that the elaborate murals decorate a theatrical space, thus, a public space that is inevitably charged with meanings of concealment and transformation. The theater murals create a space that masquerades as something else. It is an amalgamation of various spaces and locations that are brought impossibly together in an interior room. Thus, it is similar to the portrait album which also functions as fictive collection, however, in the case of the album it is an assemblage of types of people rather than types of spaces.

Here are links to the articles we read in class that have great images of the theater murals and the portraits, respectively:

http://academic.reed.edu/art/courses/art392f07/PDF%20files/NieChongzheng001.pdf

http://academic.reed.edu/art/courses/art392f07/PDF%20files/WuHungOrientations001.pdf

The Qianlong Treasure Box and Cao Fei's RMB City: Who controls?

2009-11-08T19:51:00.000-08:00

The western Wunderkammern fascinated the Qianlong emperor, who had several made for the imperial family - incorporating many of the exotic treasures extracted from around the empire into this new aesthetic platform. Housed in the context of imperial Manchu dominion (remember the significance of the jade disc on top and the square shape of the box), items could be taken out, discovered, examined together or apart, rearranged or replaced. The dramas enacted in this perfected context, the safety and power these dialogs lent to the imperial family were undoubtedly some of the main reasons the Qianlong emperor called for their production and cultivation.
It is through this lens of the imperial miniature that I intend to examine Cao Fei's RMB (Renmin Bi, or the People's Currency) City, the space inhabited by it's denizens, the artifacts within it, and its role as microcosm of the Chinese experience.
Chairman Mao's statue floats in the sea, beckoning seafaring travellers entry to the City. Rem Koolhaas's CCTV tower floats suspended overhead, while the Bird's Nest Stadium sits rusting on the shore. A factory belches smoke into the sky, the flames suggesting a permanent explosion toted over the populace. Skyscrapers drift off the coast, tossed carelessly into a milk crate. Tiananmen gate sits atop the city like a crown, watching over all, a symbol both of traditional Chinese imperialism, as well as the power of the Chinese consumer (note that the gate occupies the "heads" side of the RMB). The city is a jumble, with buildings askew and whole structures hovering threateningly over RMB City's little island. The landscape is frenetic, hyperactive, with enormous cultural symbols cast among one another in smorgasbord of cultural symbols, blown up to represent a physical space (though in the miniaturized noospace of cyberspace). As in the Qianlong treasure boxes, the city houses juxtapositions, symbolic dramas, cultural emblems to be be discovered and considered. But what kind of power is lent to the people of RMB City? Through the production of this new platform for cultural image, how can we see the way the Chinese people own their country? Especially in the utopian, idealized universe of Second Life, where people can be literally anything they want to be? Are the people given liberty at last? How does RMB City facilitate ownership of Chinese space?

Sorry for the lateness!

Who can use this space?

2009-11-08T13:04:00.000-08:00

The Gate of Heavenly Purity, Hall of Supreme Harmony, Meridian Gate, and the Gate of Heavenly Peace all line up along the central axis that runs through the Forbidden City. Crowning ceremonies, the declaration of an imperial decree, and other assemblies made use of these four points. However, lines of movement along the central axis fall into a strict order. Who could advance towards the Hall of Supreme Harmony, who could pass through the three gates, who could exit the city in what direction are questions that feed into my big question - Who was allowed to cross over the Golden River? And were there restrictions as to how the bridge should be crossed.

I will inquire into the use of the Golden River Bridge and the idea of sight. The bridge acts like a barrier between the Meridian Gate and the Hall of Supreme Harmony. Depending on what side of the bridge they stood on would affect how people participate in assemblies.

On the other hand the same question arises about the use of the red ribbon at the Tanghe river park in Qinhuangdao. This line of movement also affects site. It curves, it bends, it affects ways of seeing. Nature comes into the question as well. What does the treatment of water in both these situations say about attitudes towards the environment?

power/space

2009-11-07T23:52:00.000-08:00

The formal qualities of these two images are very similar . There is an emphasis in both to a softly textured planer base. The green and blue rows of the ocean and the green rows of stone run parallel in both images. The white clouds in Rising Sun and the white structure of the temple of heaven complex seem like mirror images. There's also similarity in the flatness of both images. The blue sky is a single layer with really subtle horizontal differences in tone. Both images also have dark brown/black vertical brakes, whether its the people or the trees.

The names of the pieces also seem to have a really powerful relationship, rising sun against oceanic sky makes me think of an upward, warm, turbulent movement. The temple of heaven complex is something above, rising, also think of a sun and oceanic sky, or the properties of water ..cleansing, purifying, regenerative. The pairing of 'oceanic sky' and 'heaven on earth' signify inversion of space. The ocean is below the sky and the heaven complex above earth. But in these images the physical planes are reversed. This relationship leads me to issues of inversions in space/power: heaven on earth, the ocean in the sky. It also makes me think about ideas of power outside of yourself. Both images are overwhelming to look at/think about. Heaven/ocean .. both really strong forces outside of yourself, the sublime (?) The colors are subtle, so they're easy to drift off in looking at.
Notes: Giuseppe Castiglione
1688-1766, Italian Jesuit Brother in China, painter at the court of the Emperor Qianlong
European painter, responsible for western style palaces in imperial gardens of the old summer palace
Temple of Heaven Complex- Taoist buildings in SE part of central Beijing
Complex was visited by Emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties for annual ceremonies of prayer to Heaven for good hearvest (Chinese heaven worship pre dates taoism)
constructed 1406-1420
Temple of Heaven renovated in the 18th century by the Qianlong Emperor
temple covers 2.73 km2 of parkland, three main groups of construction
1. hall of prayer of good harvests-triple gabled circular building, stone, where emperor prayed forgood harvests, completely wood, no nails- twelve pillars representing four seasons, 12 months and 12 traditional chiense hours respectiviely, 12 middle and outer tours represent traditional solar system
2. imperial vault of heaven-single gabled circular building, marble stone base
3. circular mound alter, empty circular platform with three levels marble stone, where emperor prayed for favorable weather. built in 1530 by jianjing emperor, rebuilt in 1740.
emperor regarded as song of heaven, temple built for prayers by emperor for good harvest (no ordinary chinese was allowed to view procession)
representations of earth/heaven within structure, represented by squares and circles
number 9, significant, circular mound altar surrounded by 9 plates
the roofs of all buildings have dark ble tiles, respresenting heaven

Fig. 1. Castiglione. "Rising Sun Against Oceanic Sky" (image). Available from: Reed Digital Collections Art and Architecture Collection (accessed 30 October 2009).

Fig. 2. "Temple of Heaven Complex" (image). Available from: Reed Digital Collections Art and Architecture Collection (accessed 30 October 2009).

Symposium Question: Cartographic and Architectural Productions of Space

2009-11-07T22:49:00.000-08:00

The Qing Dynasty Yongzheng Map of Taiwan and the Penghu Archipelago is a coastal scroll map of the island of Taiwan. Despite not being able to find any writings on this particular map, I am interested in its pictorial style, and how that style places greater value on conveying an intimate likeness of place. This map’s variable perspective facilitates a dynamic relationship between the viewer and the map, one in which the viewer’s body must shift and adapt to different ground planes, actually imitating the action of traveling. This fluid approach to space de-centers Cartesian perspective and the single vantage point of a rational subject. The space in this map can be discussed in comparison with a Cartesian approach to space, which defines space as a gridded or abstract entity that is static and organizable through measurement. Broadly defined, a map is a representation of reality that also disseminates a certain worldview. A Western map seems to derive its power from the accuracy of the map’s depiction of the land, to the point where the map and the land could even be equated. A comparison of Chinese and Western maps could illuminate ways power manifests itself differently in each type of map.

Yung Ho Chang’s Split House is part of a private collection of contemporary architecture designed by twelve Asian architects. The Commune now serves as a luxury hotel and architectural museum, and has become a prominent display of contemporary Chinese architecture. This marketing of the Commune is evidence of the branding of avante-garde architecture in China, which commodifies space (I’m not sure where this will fit into my paper yet but I thought it was important in understanding one of the ways power and space interact here). The attention paid to locality, not only when choosing this particular place but also in creating a structure that can flexibly conform to its setting, connects this approach to architectural space with the style of the pictorial map. Perhaps the design of this structure also breaks down the static rational subject of Cartesian perspective.

Both this map and this building mediate between the natural and the artificial to create a degree of bodily engagement and experience with the land. My paper will examine further parallels between the production of space in maps (as representative of the natural world) and the production of space by architecture (as existing within the natural world). These comparisons lead me to ask: What does the orientation of the subject within this pictorial and urban space reveal about the subject’s relationship to the land? And by extension, how has the Chinese state historically approached ownership and ordering of the land?

Symposium Question

2009-11-07T22:42:00.000-08:00

Fig. 1. Bingzhen, Jiao. “Classical Ladies” (image). Available from: Reed Digital Collections Art and Architecture Collection (accessed 29 October 2009).

Fig. 2. Chang, Yung Ho. “Crystal Imaging Office” (image). Available from: Atelier Feichang Jianzhu website <> (accessed 29 October 2009).

Fig. 3. Chang, Yung Ho. “Crystal Imaging Office” (image). Available from: Atelier Feichang Jianzhu website <> (accessed 29 October 2009).

Viewer accessibility, and ability to traverse layers of space, is a problem that I feel is explored in both the pieces presented for discussion: Yung Ho Chang/Atelier FCJZ’s Crystal Imaging Office (figs. 2 and 3) and Jiao Bingzhen’s “Classical Ladies” (fig. 1). The Crystal Imaging Office is located on the ground floor of an apartment complex, and is occupied by a computer rendering agency. In embodiment of the marriage of form and function, the fluidity and flexibility of view in rendered three-dimensional space is mirrored in the building’s engagement with the city street via office/showroom projections. The line between private and public space blurs, echoing the freedom of infinitesimal perspectives created through the company’s work. Furthermore, the exterior is coated with a perforated aluminum (fig. 2), applying a skin of fenestrae to every surface, allowing for a simultaneous homogenization and perfusion of the exterior. The space is open on large and small scales to view and to viewer engagement.

I struggle with Jiao Bingzhen’s work on the basis of spatial dynamism and fixedness. The Crystal Imaging Office interacts directly with the “outside” viewer, and the exterior of the building shifts to accommodate an infinite number of perspectives on various scales. Jiao Bingzhen’s work is challenging to understand on these terms. Bingzhen was a Jesuit-educated painter and astronomer in the Qing-dynasty court, and one of the earliest painters to bring linear, rather than flattened axonometic or aerial, perspective to Chinese art. His painting “Classical Ladies” makes obvious use of linear perspective, layering space in both the planar and vertical dimensions (fig. 1). Elevation is represented in platforms and edges of raised pathways traversing the space, and a distant landscape is visible through a doorway. One of the most challenging features of this work is the angle to the focal point; it is severe enough that the space becomes rather alien and inaccessible to the viewer. Though the subjects of the painting are central and at least two women are fully in view, the space appears highly marginalized, flattened by its location at the periphery of an expansive and unseen panorama. The intention in the creation of this space is especially palpable, based on our historical knowledge of the artist’s near-unprecedented explorations into linear perspective. This appears to conflict with the spirit of the painting, one of a series of paintings that showcase beautiful Chinese women. Still, the creation of depth is only possible through this linearized perspective, and the depth of layered space stands to emphasize the viewer’s engagement with the foreground. By truly locating a viewer, the Jesuit-influenced style opens up artwork to viewer engagement, placing them actively in the space of the painting. Jiao Bingzhen’s use of perspective may be a way of protecting the depicted space from a true perfusion of gaze.

Symposium Question

2009-11-07T19:16:00.000-08:00

The Golden Pagoda of Hair(fig. 1) is a Buddhist reliquary, which preserves the hair of the Emperor Qianlong’s mother. There is a long Buddhist tradition of hair preservation. It is a sacred relic. I am interested in the manner in which an architectural model has been fashioned with gems and gold to create a beautiful superstructure for the relics gathered from the pillows of the Emperor’s mother or from her combs. I am comparing this object to the Hall of Mental Cultivation (fig 2), which is comprised of the royal family’s living quarters a area for the Emperor to hear matters regarding the state. However, it would be reckless to leap from the design of the Hall of Mental Cultivation to the structure of the Golden Pagoda of Hair, as if the latter unproblematically reflected the former. Nevertheless, the interplay between spaces and structures in the Hall do have some similarities to the pagoda.

The Hall of Mental Cultivation has two distinct areas, the outside room is lavish space organized around the Emperor’s throne, where notable guests of the state were brought to speak. The room is designed for display (and implicitly to impress). The back hall is the private bedrooms of the royal family. These private areas bear some relationship to the interior capsule for hair within the obviously elegant and precious pagoda offered for veneration. In this case, the hair, which does not decay with the rapidity of flesh, is both a symbol and a proof of the continuity of the imperial presence beyond the lifetime of an individual. It retains the aura of imperial power. Knowing that the hair is within, even when we do not see it, invests the object with sacred authority and justifies its lavish beauty.

The similarities and differences between the pagoda and the Hall lead me to pose a question of the limits of correspondence in private spaces contained within public structures. Is there a particularly Chinese or perhaps Quin dynasty manner in which the natural life of the private sphere produces symbols for public veneration insofar as everything organic to the emperor participates in his supreme power? That would have to extend beyond is person to his mother or even to all of his ancestors.

Fig 1: Anonymous. Golden Pagoda of Hair. 1777. Pagoda. Palace Museum.

Fig 2: Hall of Mental Cultivation, The Forbidden City. Quin Dynasty.

Does the 798 catalogue provide its readers with a heterotopic space?

2009-11-02T14:37:00.000-08:00

Of course. However, it takes varying modes of representation to capture the space. I am not sure if the ways see New Dashanzhi represented capture it completely. For example, the students at SCI-ARC depict the area as a place of endless possibility. Their projects show New Dashanzhai as a place where the imagination is free of the bounds of reason.

On the other hand New Dashanzi is seen as an endangered space, "most of the photos in theis section were taken late spring/early summer of 2002. Photographer Mei Yuangui visited the gradually dissapearing Factory plants and documented the Factory and its workers. Most of the places in the photos have disappeared, or will cease to exist in the near future" (151. Beijing 798 Reflections on Art, Architecture, and Society in China). In this section the mood takes on a more somber tone.

The many depictions of New Dashanzi simultaneously show it in the process of vanishing and rebirth.

2009-11-02T14:26:00.000-08:00

I apologize for my tardiness. For my project I will be exploring the Golden River, which flows between the Meridian Gate and the Hall of Supreme Harmony, and its five bridges. Each bridge symbolizes one of the virtues preached by Confucius: benevolence, righteousness, rites, intelligence, and fidelity.

The object I will compare it to is the red ribbon in the Tanghe river park. Once a dump the park has been rehabilitated for public use and provides shade, light, and a way to appreciate nature.

arrangements and elements and space and shit

2009-11-02T13:26:00.000-08:00

"These places which are absolutely other with respect to all the arrangements that they reflect and of which they speak might be described as heterotopias." (352).

It is hard to classify Beijing 798, both the space and the book. Initially used a military factory, a small piece of much larger network of modernization in the early years of PRC, Beijing 798 the sapce became a "contemporary art and culture community". It is a space that attempts to encapsulate the ideal and necessary elements of community within a much larger city-structure. Its living spaces, production spaces, gathering spaces, and entertainment spaces aim to reflect their counterparts in the larger, separate, entity of the surrounding city. In the sense that the spaces of Beijing 798 aim to change or redefine the prevailing ideas, it is certainly a heterotopia in the same way the book Beijing 798 is hetertopic in that it consists of all the same elements of book (words, pictures, structure) yet re-packaged as to be completely separate . In other words, the space Beijing 798 is community in the same way that the book Beijing 798 is a book. They both reflect the arrangements we know to be nessecary to those elements, but in their otherness (caused by a basic re-working of those elements) serve to redefine our relationships will all other similar arrangements.

this isnt going to make sense

2009-11-01T21:46:00.000-08:00

factory 798 is a heterotopia of crises and time
crises, because it creats uncertainity, its unexpected, its in flux --theres are projcts about renovations, transformations, turn arounds, disjunctions between work/living spaces

the book also raises quetions about space. space, for foucault is about patterns of ordering. the book is ordered and explanined using a roadmap. work is ogranized according to boundary crossings (between buildling/property/district) , locations that arent precise but are based on particulars (which reminds me of foucault's ideas of objects floating in parts of space but are placeless

theres also points about making connections and fusing spaces, these connections between beijing and dashanzi , between the bridges and parking lots remind me of foucault's ideas on structuralism and combing previously opposed elemtents to create a new shape-or literal architectural form

then theres issues of time...

time as "more futile, transitory and precarious"
these artists are asking questions like..is time sublime? do we have the power to sublimate time? what does that even mean? something to do with interupted passings... i dont know

Beijing 2008 Opening Ceremony

2009-11-01T21:19:00.000-08:00

I will be writing on the Olympic torch, the Bird's Nest stadium, and their interaction during the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympics.

Beijing 798 catalog and "heterotopia"

2009-11-01T14:29:00.000-08:00

Although I'm not sure if, at this time, I fully understand Foucault's concept of "heterotopia," there are several aspects of the Beijing 798 catalog that seem to work with my limited understanding of his idea.

First, as Miranda pointed out, the extremely busy, and, at times, totally overwhelming organizational structure of the catalog leads to sense of exclusion through the act of immersion in the illusion of such a confusing space.

Secondly, the goal of the catalog to provide the reader with a sense of what goes on in the vast space (both temporal and physical) of Beijing 798 while still never being able to escape the fact that this project is bounded and limited to the medium of a book, seems to be in accordance with Foucault's third principle of heterotopias: "The heterotopia has the power of juxtaposing in a single real place different spaces and locations that are incompatible with each other." Thus, through the "real" space of the catalog book, an amalgamation of historical record (photographs), physical space descriptions (architectural plans) testimony (words) and representations of art objects is achieved in a way that is only possible in the space of the heterotopic catalog book.

2009-10-31T20:17:00.000-07:00

temple of heaven complex, beijing china

castiglione, rising sun against oceanic sky

2009-10-31T19:38:00.000-07:00

Object: Chen Shun Chu's "Family Parade."
Structure: Ma Qingyun's "Father's House"

Portraits of the Empress Dowager Cixi

2009-10-31T18:02:00.000-07:00

Object: I would like to focus some of the costume portrait photographs of the Empress Dowager Cixi.

Structure: Hall for the Cultivation of Character (apartments of the Empress Dowager).

Too Much To See

2009-10-31T16:16:00.000-07:00

From the very start, Beijing 728 acts as a heterotopia. The cover uses photography, which express the same principle that Foucault sees in the mirror. Photography is the creation of space where there is none. As you open the book it is immediately clear that the commonplace task of reading is made much harder here. The words do not line up exactly on the two halves of the page, pictures interrupt some sentences, and the words change color and font. It seems that part of what the authors are doing is implementing Foucault’s 5th principle of heterotopias. That is: “Anyone can enter one of these heterotopian locations, but, in reality, they are nothing more than an illusion: one thinks one has entered and, by the sole fact of entering, one is excluded.” I can see that being the case here. Anyone can open this book, but once you try to really read and understand everything that is going on in the pages, they quickly find that it is an almost impossible task. Like a city, the book provides too much to look at for one to see it all. Every time a page turns, the eye is directed 1000 places at once and it takes serious concentration and effort to focus on only one aspect at a time.

Object/Structure

2009-10-29T21:05:00.000-07:00

I will be working on the Crystal Imaging Office in Beijing, designed by Yung Ho Chang (1999)
and...
the Qing-era painting "Classical Ladies" by Jiao Bingzhen.
The layered spaces and problematization of permeability appealed to me in both these images.

Object/Structure Proposal

2009-10-29T20:25:00.001-07:00

I will be working on “The Qing Dynasty Yongzheng Map of Taiwain and the Penghu Archipelago,” held by Reed Special Collections (I cannot find an image online but we looked at it as a class) in conjunction with Yung Ho Chang’s "Split House", part of the Commune By The Great Wall project. Through this object and structure, I will look at different methods of producing and occupying space.

The Mental Cultivation of the Hair Pagoda

2009-10-27T16:35:00.000-07:00

The object that I have chosen is the Golden Pagoda of Hair, which Qianlong ordered be made in order to keep his mother's hair in.

I will be pairing that with the Emperor's living quarters/state affairs office, the Hall of Mental Cultivation.

Life Portraits of the Yongzheng Emperor (album) and the Lodge of Retiring from Hard Work (imperial theater)

2009-10-23T20:17:00.000-07:00

The Yongzheng Emperor Wearing Daoist Clothes (I may not end up using this specific painting from the album.)

Sorry, I can't find a good picture of the interior of the theater building, but we discussed it in class.

Cao Fei/China Tracy's RMB City

2009-10-23T11:06:00.000-07:00

"Cao Fei's work reflects the fluidity of a world in which cultures have mixed and diverged in rapid evolution. Her video installation and new media works explore perception and reality in places as diverse as a Chinese factory and the virtual world of second life. Applying strategies of sampling, roleplay and documentary filmmaking to capture individuals' longing and the ways in which they imagine themselves - Hip-Hop musicians, costumed characters, or digitized alter egos- Cao Fei reveals the discrepancy between reality and dream, and the discontent and disillusionment of China's younger generation. Depictions of Chinese architecture and landscape abound in scenes of hyper-capitalistic Pearl River Delta development, in amges that echo traditional Chinese painting, and in the design of her own virtual utopia, RMB city. Fascinated by the world of Second Life, Cao Fei has created several works in which she is both participant and observer through her second life avatar, China Tracy, who acts as guide, philosopher, and tourist."
http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/cao-fei

Introduction to RMB city can be found at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MhfATPZA0g

Ma Qingyun Jade Village

2009-10-14T22:46:00.000-07:00

Ma Qingyun-Biography

Dean of University of Southern California School of architecture and Principle at Shanghai design firm MADA s.p.a.m. – established in 2000, s.p.a.m.(strategy/planning/architecture/media)

“Architecture and art have nothing to do with another”

Known for participative architectural practice, social initiatives

Jade valley-located southeast of Xi’an; archaeological site of the prehistoric Lantian man, site mainly engages in comprehensive utilization of grape and ratafee resources

Place where different people/places/ideas meet only for a moment= winery

Economical model Used appropriated wooden structures from bankrupted wheat cereal factory that was previously on the property “wine making is pretty much like everything else the peasant makes, it requires only height and a clear line of movement”

Jade village-exploration of a moment, social construct built upon agriculture, wine production, resort tourism and alternate urbanism, moment of connection/disconection

1^st project/probe=event house where friends/tourists/wine experts brainstorm with Ma Qingyuns team. Place is ahouse/hotel/meeting place or none of them

Moment : the coincidental moment of departure and arrival, where memory/experience dream/imagination come together

Stone: at the site of jade village for millions of years, 200 meters away from building site, reinforced concrete construction-everyday practice—two traditions , stone is spherical so had to use bamboo framework and concrete pouring, specialized technique

Made from a type of brick indigenous to the area; Asks of significance of break in culture Same material, but different building method; Different laying, total width wider than length of brick, sliding motion, no drawing, arch team went there, locals made it

Local people wanted to roof it sooner, fear of roof collapse, Architecture, no 2 more meters, then roof wont collapse

Challenge tradition from within- being very participative, Critical process

well hall-so narrow, feels like youre in the bottom of a well

located on top of hill

inside material –wood

Beijing Capital Airport, Terminal 3

2009-10-14T14:44:00.000-07:00

· Designed by a consortium of Foster & Partners (UK), NACO (Netherlands), and ARUP (UK). Previous projects of Foster & Partners include London’s Stansted airport, Hong Kong’s Chep Lap Kok airport, and France’s Millau Viaduct.

· Cost: $3,5 billion (27 bil. Yuan)

· Second largest structure in the world: 986,000 m² are contained under a single roof; the total rises to 1,3 m² when including freestanding components of the airport.

· Airport is supposed to be evocative of flight – the contours of the roof should remind one of a dragon in flight (through the lines of the roof and the scale-like tiles on top). As the passenger moves through the terminal, their views of aircraft are never obstructed, helping ease the process of putting oneself in the context of their immediate environment

· Contains traditional Chinese building elements – roof tiles are in the imperial colors of red and gold, and the interior of the airport contains red columns that are supposed to be suggestive of a temple.

· Airport design incorporates sustainable features – the numerous skylights that allow for an unusual amount of natural light to filter through the building also collects rainwater that is repurposed for flushing toilets, running sinks, etc.

Split House by Yung Ho Chang

2009-10-14T00:51:00.000-07:00

• Part of the award-winning Commune by the Great Wall project, featuring 12 modern designs by Asian architects
o Conceptualized as an “architectural museum,”
o Originally marketed as luxury residences (“Collect the art of architecture”), the Commune now functions as an exclusive hotel, with 31 additional villas for guests
• Split House was designed by Yung Ho Chang, an American-trained architect
o Currently chair of the Department of Architecture as MIT
o Founder of Graduate Center of Architecture at Peking University (1999)
o Cofounder of China’s first private architectural firm FCJZ (1993)
• Aesthetic fuses contemporary and traditional Chinese elements, and seeks to achieve harmony with nature
o Design reconceptualizes the traditional courtyard house, forming a triangular, rather than square, courtyard with the hill closing the space
o House features open, airy rooms reminiscent of traditional bay structure of Chinese buildings
• Modularity further embodied by flexibility of occupancy; design allows for the functionality of the whole house or just a half, making it more energy efficient
o “Commune” is posited to imply communion with nature – landscape is unifying feature
o Yung Ho Chang conceived of luxury as proximity to nature
o Mountains themselves close the courtyard, and are opposed by a stream under the entrance to the house – representative of yang and yin elements, respectively
o Outer walls are built from using a traditional rammed earth technique
• First instance of rammed earth building in contemporary design
• Insulating and biodegradable material

Digital Beijing - Talking Points

2009-10-13T22:47:00.000-07:00

-Architect: Zhu Pei

-Structure completed by: Studio Pei-Zhu

-Digital Beijing is located on the Western edge of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Green.

-The building is nine stories tall, and has 1 million square feet.

-It is northwest of the Water Cube (Olympic swimming center) and the Bird's Nest (national stadium).

-During the Beijing Olympics, the building served as the technological control center for the games; home-base for all technical and security operations.

-After the Olympics, the building became a presentation space for high tech exhibitions as well as an office space for various Chinese tech companies, such as China Mobile.

-It was designed to encompass the new digital age in an architectural structure.

-It is comprised of four parallel slabs, resembling a bar code and a computer circuit board.

-Three slabs exclusively house electronic and computer equipment while the last houses the office space.

-The high tech exhibition space is subterranean.

-The facade of Digital Beijing is made to conjure up visual associations with technology: patterned concrete and glass are organized so that the facade resembled a digital circuit board.

-"We wanted to design something that was uncultivated, masculine and authentic. Something that got to the truth of what China has become." -architect Zhu Pei.

Talking Points - Luyeyuan Stone Sculpture Museum

2009-10-13T21:37:00.000-07:00

- Jiakun Architects, located in Chengdu, completed the Luyeyuan Stone Sculpture Art Museum in 2001.
- This firm focuses its work primarily in Southwestern China.
- Their design philosophy, as stated on their website: Set foot on China's status quo, positively deal with all the social conflicts coming up in the process of development, make the best use of all the advantages and change the unfavorable factors into consignments and resources for the design. A good design equals the limited resources in a creative way.
- Their work accommodates the material specificity of a given geographic boundary.
- The museum displays religious statuary that dates back 2,000 years, and as a reflection of this, the museum resembles a temple in a clearing – a meditative retreat in a suburb of Chengdu.
- The museum is constructed from reinforced concrete, shale brick, pebble, blue stone, glass and steel.
- The building covers an area of 1/037 square meters, and the site covers an area of 6.670 square meters
- “Luyeyuan” means the open weald where deer run. This references the historical spot where Buddha delivered his first sermon after attaining enlightenment. The structure’s ascetic quality reflects this connection to ancient Chinese religion.
- “On The Edge,” a book on Chinese architects, describes the museum as a “hybrid of the modern tradition” and Chinese precedent. The building’s physical materials create a dialogue between ancient statuary and modern architecture

A few images:

View across the river
Bridge from the inside
View to the outside from the exhibition space

The Red Ribbon Talking Points

2009-10-13T17:09:00.000-07:00

• The Red Ribbon was built by Kongjian Yu
• The ribbon is in the Tanghe River Park. In Qinhuangdao City, Hebei Province, China
• The project won the ASLA 2007 Design Award for Architecture
• The ribbon spans 500 meters through the park which used to be a sewage dump
• The park-goers were asked what features they would like to add to the park
o Their answers were more lighting, seating, shade, and a boardwalk
• The ribbon itself is seating, it lights up from the inside, and has a walk way that runs alongside of it, and goes through four pavilions (shaped like clouds) which provide shade
• It is designed to create a minimum impact on the environment
o There are holes in the ribbon for shrubbery to grow through, it is made out of ecologically friendly materials, and does not dominate the landscape
• Kongjian Yu is interested in making China more sustainable, while still being modern
• He sees his piece as still maintaining Chinese culture (the red color) but also being noninvasive
• The ribbon is meant to attract more visitors to the park, thereby increasing the general public’s interest in the outdoors

2009-10-12T12:11:00.000-07:00

I thought the most striking feature of the CCP's re-situating of the Forbidden City was the creation of a visible center in front of the Tiananmen Gate. The entirety of the Forbidden City faces south, and is backed by Prospect Hill to the North. From the south, one encounters each building along the central axis one after another; the privacy and importance of space increases with the depth of one's travel (or permission to travel) into the city. The emperor's private residences were sunk most deeply in this forbidden space, and most distanced from the primary entrance to the city. The decision to orient the Monument to the People's Heroes to the north created the first central space in the Forbidden City - between itself and the Tiananmen Gate - rather than layered space of increasing importance. This inward-looking central space was for the people, it was not buried behind layers and layers of walls. The space is still distinct from the city. I found it quite interesting that the square itself was still defined by what was still the center of party operation.

2009-10-11T22:47:00.000-07:00

(sorry for the poor quality picture--my house's scanner/printer broke)

I was most interested in the implications of constructing a city center in a city where community gathering places were completely nonexistent. The location of this gathering place in the center of the city, immediately before the center of the Forbidden City. In this construction, the government effectively co-opts the dominion of the Forbidden City, renegotiating the city center. Tiananman Square places the people directly in front of the Forbidden City, practically knocking at its door. However, the position of Mao's portrait directs the gaze from the Forbidden City, with Mao at its front, towards the people rather than the people onto the Forbidden City.

revolution monuments

2009-10-11T22:00:00.000-07:00

goddess of democracy-"young female who stood bravely against Mao to challenge the whole bureaucratic ideological system"
-transitional/revolutionary/temporary monument between ideologies/structures/social identity
idea of new/old permanent/flux established/revolution destruction/stabilization self-sacrifice/imposed upon

then the response to the destruction of the monument- non confrontational?
the government erected statue of the worker/farmer/soldier/intellectual - weak/forced response/subject of fear

Tiananmen

2009-10-11T21:55:00.000-07:00

The most interesting aspect of the transformation of Tiananmen square is the extent and precision of the destruction to previous structures. As Wu Hung says, "the destruction of old buildings in front of Tiananmen did not just serve the practical purpose to make room for a large public square, but was considered a symbolic gesture to destroy the past" (Wu Hung 23). While iconoclasm in the name of communist revolution is not unique to China, it is notable that it took nearly an entire decade to tear down only a handful of Imperial Chinese landmarks. This extended period of deconstruction indicates to me a rather politically complex process of deciding how this extremely important space was to be used. Indeed, the results of such a process are evident in the testimony on page 21 of Wu Hung's book, "Inevitably my shouts and waving became mechanical and limp, not triggered by sight but moved by a nameless collectivity of which I had become a part" (Wu Hung 21). For communist leaders, this loss of individuality brought on by the enormity of public space would most certainly be considered a success, along with the architecture that triggered it.

tiananmen square

2009-10-11T21:44:00.001-07:00

The CCP was able to transform Tiananmen into a symbol of socialist modernity by shifting the people's historical focus from the Forbidden City as the epicentre of Chinese life to the new Tiananmen Square. To anchor this shift, the Monument to the People's Heroes was erected outside of the Forbidden City. Laden with images simlar to Augustus' Ara Pacis, it was to commemorate the revolution and signify a firm break with China's feudal past.

Zero Point Tiananmen

2009-10-11T20:50:00.000-07:00

"Then there is an enriched image - Tiananmen Square, a vast open ground centred on and defined by a series of monuments constructed ove a period of some five hundred years. Many westerners learned its name only after June 1989, but to every Chinese, from a college freshmen to the country's paramount leader, the Square has been the centre of political tension and attention throughout China's modern history: the demonstration on 4 May 1919 in prtest against the Treaty of Versailles handin over Chinese lands to Japan; the patriotic march on 18 March 1926; the demonstratin on 9 December 1935..." (Wu Hung. 15. Remaking Beijing).

The largest city square in the world. Consciously relocated as the centre of Beijing. Tiananmen square visually and symbolically lives up to that decision. From the proverbial question, "What came first, the chicken or the egg?", did Tiananmen Square make way for the people or did the people make way for Tiananmen Square?

Gate of Heavenly Peace

2009-10-11T19:00:00.000-07:00

Over the course of the shift from a imperial to a communist society the most dramatic change for the Forbidden City was the relocation of the focal point of Beijing from the center of The Forbidden City onto Tiananmen Square. From this shift onto this vast communal space, buildings and monuments could be constructed to compete with (or at least to redefine) the imposing facade of Tiananmen Gate. The introduction of new institutional buildings alongside The Forbidden City imposed the new ideology of The People's Republic on the space, helped in part by the repurposing of the Tiananmen Gate by the hanging of Mao's portrait and its use on the national coat of arms. The pinnacle of the Chinese nation was now no longer on the exclusive enclave of the Chinese Emperors but a new communal space, framed by the emblems of a new society.

2009-10-11T18:17:00.000-07:00

One of the most important elements of the of CCP's alterations to Tiananmen Square was the intentional redefinition of the public nature of the square. In the past, the public aspect of the square was very limited in scope, extending only to those who enjoyed social and political power. The CCP recognized the vast space's potential to be refined, as Wu Hung says, as a "political space" that would stand for ideas of newfound openness and possibility that the CCP hoped would be automatically associated with the new Communist regime. Therefore, this is not truly free public space; instead the new Tiananmen Square represented a sort of contrived and prescribed public-ness. This specific type of prescribed publicness is evident in the types of structures with which the CCP chose to surround and impose upon Tiananmen Square. Each monument contains elements that reference the importance and presentness of the CCP. By adorning the Monument to the People's Heroes with images of a repeated anonymous figure as well as an inscription by Mao, the monument emphasizes Mao's vision of history as a continuum and subjects the people of China to this specific conception. Thus, though the Square remains a public space, it bears the inescapable imprint of the Communist political regime. Similar to the figures in the People's Heroes Frieze, visitors to Tiananmen Square become a testament to the continuation and sustainability of the CCP.

Act vs. Ideology

2009-10-11T17:09:00.000-07:00

In imperial China Tiananmen Square was mostly a private space, an inaccessible relic of the feudal system. As Wu Hung states in the first chapter of Remaking Beijing, state-created monuments and political action/expression both transformed the newly opened space of Tiananmen Square into a public emblem of socialist present. The demonstration led by University students on May 4, 1919 decisively separated the square from it's imperial past. The demonstration protested the Treaty of Versailles, which handed over Chinese lands to Japan after WWI. This mass movement reclaimed Tiananmen as a public space for the people and changed the role of public opinion and demonstrations in Chinese political discourse.

The monuments constructed around Tiananmen Square are the second way in which expressions of power shape the space of the square. The state reasserted control over the space through political structures, as an attempt to counteract public demonstrations (although the square itself seems untouchable, the structures can only direct power around the square). The resultant tension between political acts and political ideology dictates the identity of Tiananmen Square, and allows such a space to undergo constant change (similar to Pierre Nora’s “milieux de memoire," environments of memory).

Changing Culture

2009-10-11T14:12:00.000-07:00

The Tiananmen Square of the past (before Mao's rule) was specifically designed to promote the idea of the emperor's centrality and order in the government. It used the ancient ideas of Yin and Yang and other ancient chinese designs which encourage good luck and oneness with the rest of the world. The new Square however, is designed to foster a feeling of community, scientific advancement, and industrialization. The Chinese Communist Party destroyed the old buildings surrounding the square which linked the space to it's long past. They also erected the Monument to the People's Heros which not only faced Tiananmen (north) this linking it with the gate, but implied that the people who supported the party were heroes and martyrs. Finally, simply by opening the space up to the public, the Party created a sort of center for Communist thought and propaganda to be encountered.

PAM gallery design for Beijing

2009-10-08T13:46:00.000-07:00

As we think about the gallery tour, please consult the design. For next Thursday, please plan to bring 1/2 page of bulleted "talking points" and about 1 page of prose describing what you believe to be the most significant, meaningful, or just plain strange aspects of the structure you're studying.

Tim, I am afraid you'll have to switch objects from the medals to the torch. I strongly suggest that you watch the final 10-15 minutes of the Opening Ceremony (NBC broadcast available on DVD in IMS). Note the resonance between the digital scroll unfurling at the top of the Bird's Nest stadium as the torch is carried one last lap around the stadium and the design of the torch itself (and note as well what images are being unscrolled as you watch, especially those shown in the seconds just before the torch lights the Olympic flame). Nate, you also will need to switch objects, I am sorry to say. If you are interested in eco design, perhaps one of Zhu Pei's structures might suit?

China Under the Empress Dowager: Being the History of the Life and Times of Tz’u Hsi

2009-10-04T22:36:00.001-07:00

John Ottaway Percy Bland and Sir Edmund Trelawny Backhouse’s China Under the Empress Dowager: Being the History of the Life and Times of Tz’u Hsi is a rather curious book – though it was written by 19^th-century Westerners who were convinced that China was a “backwards” land in desperate need of modernization, they nonetheless managed to portray Tz’u Hsi in a dignified light. Despite numerous accounts of her shrewd and iron-fisted handling of imperial politics, a spectacular taste for scheming and vengance, and her shocking lack of fear at asserting herself in the court, Bland and Backhouse lavish praise upon her for being a staunch defender of the Empire (as her foresight and understanding of court life allowed her to thwart numerous attempts on the throne, her person, etc.). There are further occasional admonishments for the Empress Dowager’s seeming love of decadence and splendor, however the biography concludes that she was a more-than-capable stateswoman who managed to command unprecedented power in an area of life not normally reserved for women of her status. The book ends with a passage that one wouldn’t expect to read describing the ruler of a “backwards” kingdom: “Reluctantly she bade farewell…to the life she had lived with so keen a zest; but unlike England’s Tudor Queen, she bowed gracefully to the inevitable, leaving the scene with steadfast and Imperial dignity…” [316].

Wandering in Nortern China by Harry A. Franck

2009-10-04T21:58:00.000-07:00

Wandering in Northern China is about a trip through Korea and Northern China by Harry A. Franck, a popular American travel author of the early twentieth century. As his only objective for the book is a "leisurely jaunt to wherever new clues to interest led (him)", the author effectively excuses himself of any sort of academic responsibility he might have be subject to. Included in the list of chapters are "Off the Beaten Track in Cho-Sen", "Rambles in the Province of Confucius", and "In Bandit-Ridden Honan".

Yet, while he may write under the protection of popular entertainment writing, he nonetheless has some rather educated and outspoken opinions. Moreso than anything else, it seems, he is concerned with the lack of reliable information on China and its culture that makes it to American audiences. More specifically, he aims to dispell common beliefs that improved living conditions and "barbaric" practices such as foot-binding were becoming more and less prevalent, respectively. "For all the telephones, airplanes, and foreign clothes in the coast cities," he says in the preface, "the great mass of the Chinese have been affected barely at all by this urge toward modernity and Westernism". Indeed, his focus on the American perceptions of China serve to be a sort of diatribe against the American public and national spirit: "England is a little better informed on the subject than we, because she is less idealistic, more likely to look at the facts instead of trying to make facts fit preconceived notions of essential human perfection". This general theme, of pointing out the hardships of the average Chinese life in the face of political manouevers to cover them up to outside audiences, prevails throughout the book.

La Longue March

2009-10-04T21:35:00.000-07:00

In 1957 Simone de Beavoir finished La Longue March or The Long March (translated by Austryn Wainhouse). In 1955 Simone was invited to travel throughout China. The first passage I want to call your attention to reads:

"The wall of the Forbidden City. A red-and-gold pavilion embedded in this wall protrudes foward to the sidewalk's edge: this was once a gate to the Imperial Palace. It is now the entrance to the seat of a new government. The wall thickens until it becomes a terrace, here is another pavilion dominating another passageway: we are passing in front of Tien An Men. These monumnets also disconcert me; I know that their vermillion colonnades, their horned roofs covered with gilt tile are authentically Chinese; and yet they do not seem to me to be an integral part of the city" (13).

Recent events in 1949 seem to color Simone's idea of the Forbidden City. She writes:

"On the other hand I am perfectly willing to admit that mere eyesight is not enough to bring out everything an object may contain; nevertheless, I have very often found that eyes are not useless and that objects when looked at discloses something To walk down a street is an immediate, irrecusable experience for which no hypothesis about city, however ingenious, can be a substitute or as instructive" (15-16).

Even in understanding her own short comings Simone goes on to talk of the economic, cultural, industrial, historical, & etc. aspects of China. Not unlike the other Old Hands Simone's attitude towards China still comes across as fantastical, assuming, and lofty. Yet at the same time her attitude is also encouraging.

O. Erdberg, Tales of Modern China, 1933

2009-10-04T19:59:00.000-07:00

Tales of Modern China by Oskar Erdberg is a firsthand account of Erdberg's travel in China, his conversations, and the events he witnesses. Published in 1933 in "The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics," Erdberg's work is of a primarily political bent, probing the nascent socialist ideologies among the vast population of downtrodden Chinese laborers.
Erdberg's depiction of China in the early 1930's is not a favorable one. "China does not exist!" he exclaims, overhearing the conversation of two European entrepreneurs, apparently oblivious to the culture around them. For Erdberg, China is a "no-man's land" slung miserably between monuments of capitalist dominion. China is a big playground for bourgeois westerners, he describes the two "sinologists" as "plaintiffs, witnesses and judges, all rolled into one." China has become a great big game board, with the capitalists making all the rules. Between the Shanghai and Hong Kong stock exchanges, English cotton mills, French and Japanese railways and international courts, there is no other significant activity besides the operations necessary for supporting capitalist enterprises. At least for the two European gentlemen, who are pleasantly discussing exoticized Chinese lore.
But Erdberg sees hope on the horizon. Quoting Lenin (alongside Buddhist notions of reincarnation), he writes: "It is not so long ago that China served as an example of a country in a state of age-long stagnation. But now, political life is seething in China; the social movement is stirring the country!..." Erdberg's account of China in the early 1930's is at the tail end of the one we saw in the reading this weekend, wave after wave of European intrusion has deposed traditional Chinese rule, and yoked the nation under capitalism. But, as Erdberg says, the wheels are turning, and socialism is soon to make its violent entrance.

Also, this guy.

2009-10-04T19:38:00.000-07:00

Tibetologist, friend and biographer of the 13th Dalai Lama, and international politician and civil servant, Sir Charles Bell.

Roy Chapman Andrews' "Across Mongolian Plains"

2009-10-04T19:22:00.000-07:00

Roy Chapman Andrews is essentially on safari in Mongolia, as part of the Second Asiatic Expedition of the American Museum of Natural History. As far as I can tell, this involves collecting and preserving specimens (two taxidermists are along for the ride). There is much filming and estimating of the respective speeds of antelopes, wolves, camels, and deer, and Andrews refers to himself primarily as a “sportsman.”

To him, Outer China seems a great last wilderness, and its people, curiousities. He has a great appreciation for the emptiness, remoteness, and frontier-like quality of the desert. Of himself and his wife, he writes: “we might both have, as a precious heritage for future years, the memories of this strange land of romance and of mystery. Now the dream had been fulfilled and never have I entered a new country with greater hopes of what it would bring me.”

He is quite infatuated with exotic history and people of the plains, choosing to name his pony Kublai Khan. He laments the failing of the native Mongolians to live up to his expectation of exoticism – he is disappointed by the utilitarian nature of a woman’s shoes: “She is altogether satisfying to the lover of fantastic Oriental costumes, except in the matter of footgear, and this slight exception might be allowed, for she has so amply decorated every other available part of her anatomy.” He writes that motor cars, despite their necessity for travel, have “stolen the sanctity of the plains” as “only another evidence of the passing of Mongolian mystery.” The incursion of the practical into his romantic experience is deeply unsatisfying. For him, China should fall neatly into the category of the Oriental. Its pollution by Western constructs and ideologies is upsetting, as evidenced by his anticipation of Outer China as a last outpost of purer culture and landscape.

A true collector, Andrews situates himself in a position of superiority over most of what he encounters in China, with the exception of his blessedly romantic Mongols. He is blatantly racist and haughty, laughing at the plight of Chinese officials sent to regulate their passage back through the Great Wall and into China proper: “With wildly waving arms they shouted at us to halt, but we paid not the slightest attention, and they had to jump aside to avoid being run down. The spectacle which these Chinese soldiers presented, as they tried to arrest us, was so ridiculous that we roared with laughter. Imagine what would happen on Fifth Avenue if you disregarded a traffic policeman’s signal to stop!”

“Escape With Me! An Oriental Sketch-book” by Osbert Sitwell.

2009-10-04T17:22:00.000-07:00

Written by the English writer Osbert Sitwell, this travel-book visually and sensually approaches the author’s travels through China. Sitwell intends this book to be for amusement, a personal record and description of the parts of China that he found interesting during his visit. His descriptions are rooted in the perspective of a traveler in a foreign land and culture, a perspective that he embraces. In the preface he writes, “Again, with China, my judgments and impressions may, for all I know, be more chinoiserie than Chinese, for I Cannot – nor in any case would I – divest myself of Western ideas and of the culture which, such of it as I possess, comes from the shores of the Mediterranean, and not form those of the China Seas.”

This approach to travel limits his understanding of the culture but offers him the type of experience he is looking for in China. His poetic writing style romanticizes his experience in an attempt to capture a mythic China that is disappearing rapidly. To him, China is a part of the world that is still available for play and fantasy, and he ultimately uses China as a way to escape from Europe and treats Chinese travel as a collectible experience for European visitors.

Harrison Forman -- Memories of Red China-- 1945

2009-10-04T15:42:00.000-07:00

Memories of Red China is American journalist Harrison Forman's first-hand account of his experiences with the Communist Party of China in 1945. Forman was a resident foreign correspondent covering World War II in China.
Forman begins his book by describing the level of secrecy surrounding the political group. He states that Chinese government did not at first allow foreign reporters to travel to the region of the country in which they were contained. Once permission to travel to the area is granted by the Chinese government, Forman describes the somewhat difficult journey the reporters made from their base to the communist frontier. It is clear that the book is intended for an American audience, as it relies heavily on comparisons to American culture. When describing a small town they visit along their way, Forman writes that it is a "bustling little boomtown with a frontier atmosphere." Forman seems to be equating this town with American conception of the frontier West.
In a later section of the book called "I Enter Red China" Forman seems to be quite impressed with the culture of the group. Again, Forman relies on analogies to Western culture to describe the Chinese. He describes the first set of communist officers he encounters as looking like "Hollywood bandits with big Mauser pistols swinging at their hips, rifles on their shoulders..." However, the more time he spends in communist territory the more respect he has for their precepts and way of life. He seems particularly pleased with what he interprets as a pervasive sense of modesty. Upon meeting a soldier who he later finds out is something of a war hero, Forman says that "at first the officer appeared to have no very striking characteristics. He spoke little and he was without visible pretensions." Forman writes that this soldier, Wang Cheng, is quite brave and has proven his strength several times in combat. Forman says that Cheng described his deeds as if they were nothing special, yet displayed "a boyish curiosity about our cameras, typewriters and other fancy gadgets."
In this section, Forman relates Cheng's story of how the group has survived in the rough, uncultivated conditions of northern China. He quotes Cheng describing how implements of old Chinese culture aided in the creation and survival of the new Communist enclave. "In ancient abandoned temples near by we found temple bells, urns and idols which we melted and hammered into plowshares."

A journey to the tea countries of China

2009-10-04T12:06:00.000-07:00

I chose A journey to the tea countries of China by Robert Fortune, published in 1852. From the beginning I was struck his portrayal of acquisition and the collectible aspect of Chinese objects--in the introduction he mentions a striking Asian tree which "will one day produce a striking and beautiful effect on our English landscape". He is reverent towards Chinese vegetation, but deeply suspicious of the people--"the Chinese are certainly bad enough," he declares, while positing that they poison the seeds of plants being sent to Europe and the Americas so as to prevent the export of Chinese plants.

Chinese scenery and vegetation are treated as beautiful objects and sights for collection, that have sadly had the misfortune of being located amongst the Chinese rather than the British. Man-made objects, however, are viewed as a curiosity at best, and Fortune gives trace descriptions in order to get to the good landscape stuff, or discuss his acquisition of various tea plants and other things to take to the Indian plantations for mass production. He views his journey with the eye of a colonist, often commenting that this or that plant ought to be introduced in their Indian colonies as it would prove useful to the natives.

Land and Labor in China, Tawney 1932

2009-10-03T18:34:00.000-07:00

memorandum for the conference of the institute of pacific relations, shanghai November 1931
extensive comparison of agrarian culture between china and other countries
concluding that the operations in china are over manned and under capitalized
interesting feature of the test: how consistently disappointed and disdainful the the writer is of china agrarian methods and yields --methods inadequate/primitive
"chine agriculture is intensive in its use of labor, unintensive in the inadequacy of the equipment by which labor is aided and in its fauilture to make use of the results of science."

How to get around in China

2009-10-03T16:17:00.000-07:00

The book I picked is called The Soul of China, by Richard Wilhelm (1928). The book outlines Wilhelm's journey from Germany through China, providing a detailed account of Chinese life around the time of the Boxer Rebellion. One of the common themes throughout the book is that of transportation in China. In just a few short chapters, Wilhelm travels via horse, sedan chair, train, traveling cart, and boat. In each circumstance, he narrates what the function of the particular form of transportation is in China, and how it compares to western modes of transportation.
Wilhelm seems to be conflicted between his western notion that modern technology is better, and his experiences with ancient Chinese customs. When Wilhelm takes the train for instance he divulges that the people in a small village "fear that the snorting and rattling of fire chariots might disturb the peace of the ancestral graves" (96). He then goes on to justify those fears, saying that the construction of the railroad lines often overturned bones and burial sites.
The traveling cart too provides an opportunity for Wilhelm to consider the benefits of using ancient technology. He says" later on I began to appreciate the advantages of a Chinese traveling cart, but until one has got used to it one can only regard it as an instrument of torture" (99).
There are plenty more scenes, including ones where he is lead through a parade in a sedan chair, or is ripped off by a boat captain, that further emphasize the difficulty Wilhelm has when examining transportation through China.

The East is Still Red

2009-10-02T10:16:00.001-07:00

Happy Belated National Day! Time to break out the military uniforms and the firecrackers.
In slow motion...(tableau and procession, combined!), click here.

2009-09-30T00:08:00.000-07:00

The treasure boxes and the views of the empress’ rooms struck me as both containing framing elements, which seem crucial to both the conveyance and manipulation of scale. The treasure boxes’ overworked and overly specific compartments (one trinket per compartment) and the Hall of Great Supremacy’s doorways and window portals raised, in my mind, a direct correlation to our discussion of the gigantic and sublime. Framing seems to me to be a way of exerting control, of placing something of understood size in the foreground as a referent, so as not to be overwhelmed by the view. This is analogous to photographs containing a pencil or coin to size the official subject matter. Framing, to me, seems to be a protective element – to prevent our being overwhelmed by the gigantic in nature. The moon gates framed landscapes as one looked through them, and their size (roughly human size, all things considered) and uniform shape (circular) were crucial rendered the landscape relatively harmless – there is no danger of losing one’s self to the sublime when viewing through a frame/lens of grounded, measured reality.
With the treasure boxes, the compartmentalization seems to work to near-opposite effect: when dealing with the miniature, compartmentalization gives license to believe in the miniature. A tiny framing element, in this case, the compartment, that matches the tiny-ness of the trinket renders it quite real, because we’re used to experiencing framing on our scale, such as the doorways and windows of our residences. The frame determines the reality, so that size relative to a framing element is the determiner of perceived size. Distant mountains look small through a moon gate, but a treasure box’s frame to its trinkets give the viewer permission to consider the trinkets on a human scale, as opposed to simply holding miniatures in one’s hand, where they are clearly small.

2009-09-29T23:43:00.001-07:00

The Treasure Box and the Hall of Great Supremacy exhibit the tension between inner and outer spaces that Stewart describes in her discussion of the dollhouse as a “center within center” or “within within within.” These cultural objects allude to the larger space of the Forbidden City, as well as the political body of China. The Forbidden City could function as a miniature in relation to the Chinese state (the subject), which Stewart’s analogy between miniatures and childhood helps explain. Like a dollhouse, the Forbidden City is “limited in physical scope yet fantastic in its content,” and “presents in some ways a miniature and fictive chapter in each life history; it is a world that is part of history, at least the history of the individual subject, but remote from the presentness of adult life.”
The idea of the Forbidden City as a miniature (or dollhouse) might help analyze the significance of the space’s invisibility. Stewart writes that “the dollhouse is a materialized secret; what we look for is the dollhouse within the dollhouse and its promise of an infinitely profound interiority.” Perhaps the Forbidden City is a starting point for a Chinese narrative, supporting Stewart’s assertion that the miniature is an analogical model, a way of making meaning.

Political Miniatures

2009-09-29T23:05:00.000-07:00

One of the things in particular that struck me about the treasure box was the type of treasures inside. Curios and miniatures offer the drama of relationships and fictions in between them, their malleability in harmony with the depth of their near-linguistic significance. However, instead of the obvious subjects this could entail (i.e. people, animals or particularly energetic objects like tops and balls), the things reproduced in miniature are highly symbolic objects, like statues of lions, vases, sculptures and mandalas. These miniatures are almost miniatures of language itself. What's more, many of these are symbols of authoritative institutions, of national identity, of political wealth and control. To examine and juxtapose these miniatures is to be reminded of the structure of Chinese society, to rehearse the role of each item within a system of imperial control.

2009-09-29T22:09:00.001-07:00

As others have pointed out, both the treasure-box and the interior of the Forbidden City are heavily compartmentalized structures. One is meant to be appreciated at a very personal level (treasure-box) while the other (the interior of the Forbidden City) can only be appreciated in the same way that Stewart says we handle gigantic objects – by moving through them. The treasure-box, a dollhouse, and a wunderschrank are all receptacles that “invite us to experiment with order and disorder” [Stafford 7] through easy re-arrangement of the contained objects in different compartmentalized spaces [Stafford 9]. With that in mind, it doesn’t seem like much of a stretch to think of the Forbidden City as a wunderschrank built on a scale as to surround humans as they contemplate the multitude of objects within. Re-arrangement within this mammoth curiousity cabinet was, of course, very possible – considering that varying emperors shifted halls they occupied, etc.

palaces and treasure boxes

2009-09-29T21:03:00.000-07:00

Upon first viewing the two objects, what was most striking to me were the elements of compartmentalization that both the Hall of Supremacy and the treasure boxes share. Though clearly on totally different scales, both the room and the box employ structural elements of limitation that help to define and augment the largeness of the first and the smallness of the second. Without some sort of organizing and, in my opinion, limiting principle, neither of the two would be as understandable or comprehensible for the human user. The structural elements of hidden-ness and openness, (the hidden compartments of the treasure box and the walls and built-in windows of the hall) seem to be to be ideologically in line with Stewart's conceptions of the gigantic and the miniature.

2009-09-29T13:11:00.000-07:00

In viewing the empress' rooms in conjunction with the treasure box, I was struck by the correspondence between the two. The rooms of the empress bear the same intricate, worked decoration and the appearance of being set inward--the rooms seem separated while still interlocked, like the treasure box. In conjunction to the treasure box, the human body is enlarged in correspondence to the miniature. As the empress' rooms are part of an interlocking, closed-off whole, I wonder if the experience of being there is not unlike the experience of feeling powerless and pawn-like in relation to something much larger. The rooms couldn't be the gigantic in exactly the Stewart defines it, as they are very far from natural--the rooms share more in common with what she defines the miniature. They are domestic, the overly cultural, and the controlled. I'm not sure how to reconcile these ideas.

It seems as if the empress' rooms could almost be a miniature in the way that Stewart conceives of it, and yet it for the human body, it would inspire the feelings of the gigantic. The Forbidden City acts as a sort of dollhouse--it compartmentalizes each social figure in its place, and institutes architectural division between them, effectively controlling the city as one can control a dollhouse.

Giant Humans

2009-09-28T21:03:00.000-07:00

Stafford suggests that by collecting miniatures we are trying to capture nature itself. Each piece is metonym, representing a difference section of nature or culture. By fitting all these pieces into a box, like the one in Empress' room, you effectively control the world. The ultimate goal is elevate the status of humans (or more specifically the emperor). As the center of the universe, the treasure box would be a physical representation of the power that the royal family held over China. They not only control the human aspect of life, they control the natural aspects too.

Stafford, in her discussion of the dollhouse, says "the dollhouse is consumed by the eye." The human is thus the container and the gigantic, the treasure box is the contained and the miniature. We have effectively reversed the roles that nature typically holds on us. It is human nature to not be satisfied by simply standing on top of the animal kingdom, we have to constantly reaffirm that our existance has a purpose, and we do that by attempting to control everything we can find.

This discussion of the gigantic vs/and the miniature reminds me of the hyperrealist sculptor Ron Mueck. I put photo's of one of his sculptures below. He plays with scale in order to force his viewers to think about the sublime in the same way that we were discussing in class. The Washing Post writes in an article on his work that "If you stare long and deeply enough, you experience a horrific beauty. Yet the very same verisimilitude creates a weird distance that is as equally penetrating of our current existential state." I thought that was a lot like Staffords claims about the sublime.

Big Treasure, Little Treasure

2009-09-28T13:33:00.000-07:00

This treasure box evinces the idea of both the miniature and the gigantic that Susan Stewart talks about in chapter 3, The Gigantic, in her book On Longing. She writes, the "miniature represents closure, interiority, the domestic, and the overly cultural, the gigantic represents infinity, exteriority, the public, and the overly natural" (On Longing. 70). Like all pairs of compliments the miniature and gigantic operate together, one cannot exist without the presence of the other.

Through the virtue of being a container the cache corresponds to the gigantic and its contents within the miniature. Zooming out we see a person holding the treasure box. The person who possesses the box now corresponds with the gigantic and the box and its trinkets with the miniature. Zooming out again we see the empress' halls surrounding the viewer holding the box. The relationship changes again. The room is container and the viewer the contained. Both objects remain constants in this equation, it is the position of the viewer in relationship to the objects that changes their appearance.

things i dont understand about the !!!GIGANTIC!!!

2009-09-26T16:07:00.000-07:00

the article posed some attributes of the miniature that seem, to me, confusing and irreconcilable
'closure/interiority/finite/private/individuall' paired with 'distance/gigantic/public/natural' how exactly are these attributes experienced? paired? and in what order?
it seems especially strange to think of the miniature in relation to issues of sublimity
the object were looking at is seen in relation to the body, the sublime is outside of the body. the minature and the room the minatures are displayed in all look flat and finite.

new China Design Now website

2009-09-26T12:27:00.000-07:00

Hello all,

The website for the show is up, and is chock full of information about lectures, films, buildings, dresses, cosmetics, and the exhibition itself, and things in it. Please visit http://chinadesignnowportland.org

Enjoy!

this weekend...

2009-09-25T08:51:00.000-07:00

SEPT 27 SUN 4:30 PM PACIFIC NW FILM CENTER

BIRD'S NEST--HERZOG & DE MEURON IN CHINA

GERMANY 2008

DIRECTOR: CHRISTOPH SCHAUB, MICHAEL SCHINDELM

BIRD'S NEST follows star Swiss star architects Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron (London's Tate Modern, Barcelona Forum, San Francisco's de Young Museum), as they literally and metaphorically built bridges between two cultures, two architectural traditions, and two political systems. (88 mins.)

IF YOU CHOSE TO ATTEND, PLEASE KEEP YOUR TICKETS AND RECEIPTS SO THAT I CAN REIMBURSE YOU AT THE END OF THE SEMESTER

Also, please note that NW Film Center accepts cash or check only, no credit cards.

Visual Display and Sparth

2009-09-22T22:42:00.000-07:00

I am all about concept art and design, especially as it relates to the entertainment industry. Nicolas "Sparth" Bouvier is in my starting line up of favorite conceptual artists. You can see more of his work here: http://www.sparth.com/

I think his body of work is a great example of the overlap between landscape painting and science fiction. Scott Bukatman emphasized the use of space, time, scale, and light in the creation of the sublime in his article. I think these images do a great job of bringing his words off the page.

2009-09-21T09:12:00.000-07:00

2009-09-21T01:33:00.000-07:00

Chengde

2009-09-20T23:32:00.001-07:00

Chengde Map

2009-09-20T22:06:00.001-07:00

Chengde on engde

2009-09-20T21:10:00.000-07:00

Retreat @ Chengde

2009-09-20T21:05:00.001-07:00

The Chengde Retreat as envisioned by Miranda

2009-09-20T20:30:00.000-07:00

Mountain Manor to Escape the Hot Heat

2009-09-20T20:09:00.000-07:00

If you squint it sort of looks accurate....

Chengde Retreat

2009-09-20T19:22:00.001-07:00

Retreat at Chengde

2009-09-20T19:14:00.001-07:00

2009-09-16T12:57:00.000-07:00

Action over great distances

2009-09-16T12:31:00.000-07:00

docent training

2009-09-16T11:29:00.000-07:00

We will train the docents about the Beijing "Future City" on Wednesday, October 28, at 3:30 pm. Please meet that day at the Portland Art Museum lobby.

To transform ourselves into "foreign experts" on the "Future City:"

1. please select 3 objects that grab you visually and conceptually from the PDF file containing all of the Beijing-related objects and pictures in the show, and email your choices to Lisa by Sunday, September 20.

2. I will cull through everyone's preferences, and then assign each of you 2 objects to research, and provide you with the museum labels for those objects (these are draft labels, so please do not circulate them). You will have the opportunity to teach the rest of us about these 2 objects before the fall break (I will update the syllabus this weekend).

3. On Wednesday, October 14, we will circulate a document that has the "talking points" of each of the objects we want to address in the tour. Keep in mind that tours in the gallery last about 45-50 minutes, and while our tour will be a relatively in-depth exploration of Beijing, the docents also will be teaching the public about Shenzhen and Shanghai. So we can't weigh them down with too much information. In preparation for drafting this document, please post your talking points to the blog by Tuesday, October 13, at noon.

4. On Monday, October 26, we will do a run-through of our gallery tour together, at 3:30. The Museum is closed on Mondays, so we will need to meet at the Sculpture Garden door to be admitted.

Flourishing Suzhou in the 18th Century

2009-09-16T10:42:00.000-07:00

People come and people go...

flourishing suzhou

2009-09-16T08:21:00.001-07:00

2009-09-15T21:58:00.000-07:00

Image from "Picture of the Flourishing Suzhou City"

2009-09-15T20:20:00.001-07:00

One or Two?

2009-09-14T13:44:00.001-07:00

Wu Hung's assertion in the last paragraph of his article on the Qianlong Emperor's costume portraits that "(egocentrism) is perhaps the essence of the...emperor's masquerade", seems to be oversimplify an otherwise well constructed argument. The Pasztory article tells us that tribal cultures all over the world use the development of style as a way to distinguish themselves from other, sometimes very similar, peoples living around them. These distinctive styles, therefore, serve a multitude of purposes, from promoting peace and cooperation to their ability to delineate enemies. Is it not until we look at the dominant empires of the world before we begin to see assimilation for assimilation's sake, or in other words, as a novelty (as we do in the masquerades balls of 18th century Europe). The Qianlong emperor's costume paintings, and particular the one above, is the intersection of these two paradigms. For two thousand years, China had been relatively isolated culture from those surrounding it with distinctive visual arts, dress, and even hairstyle. With the invasion of the north of the Qing dynasty, we see the first time that China was ruled by unapologetic foreigners. That is, rulers who refused to abandon previous customs for those of China. After this, as well as artistic influence from Europe, we see the first mjaor use of foreign styles in the novel sense (the retinue of costuse portraits). Yet, as Wu Hung points out, Qianlong does not forego the impulse to use stylistic masquerading for political ends. "The purpose of this painting is not to exhibit or demonstrate, but to conceal and deceive" (35). To say that an emperors desire to have himself painted over and over again, albeit in different styles, is a product of his self-obsession seems, to me, like a pretty obvious claim. What is interested here is not the impulse to have a potrait painted, but to do so in a way that bridges the gap between ancient and modern.

Costume portriat of the Qianlong emperor by Jin Tingbiao

2009-09-13T22:58:00.000-07:00

I think this piece does a lot to elucidate the Qianlong emperor's methods of legitimization. First, the natural setting in which we identify the emperor is beautiful and majestic in its own right. However, its beauty has been added to and enhanced by human creations. The presence and prominence of architectural elements that identify this space as a "royal retreat" are a testament to Qianlong's power. Thus, the power of Quinlong to literally transform a space is an important aspect of his authority, while subtly alluding to his identity as a foreign conqueror. The fact the this natural setting has been lifted from another work that resides in his personal artistic collection, coupled with the fact that Qianlong makes a point to inform the viewer of this fact, demonstrates the legitimizing value that Qianlong placed on the concept of ethnic and visual appropriation. Though employing a pre-existing image that depicts a previous event, Qianlong transforms the image into a testament to his own authority by placing himself (though disguised) in the picture, and inscribing the image itself with his own interpretation, thereby infringing on the viewer's ability to form their own opinions about the piece.

Fig. 12a,b in Wu Hung's article, "One or Two?" as well numerous other "masquerade portraits"

2009-09-13T21:14:00.000-07:00

One or two?
- My two faces never come together yet are never separate.
One can be Confucian or the other Mohist.
Why should I worry or even think?

The two images of the Yongzheng emperor are described by Wu Hung as possessing two separate intentions, describing two identities, duplicates of the emperor's countenance, one within the other. In the three versions of this painting that exist, each bears a different name, although including the same poem above. One of the names he adopts is the name of a Buddhist deity with three faces. As evidenced here, as well in the many other exotic-dress portraits in the article, the image of the emperor becomes increasingly confused. The intent here is not to describe the qualities within the emperor, but to describe the emperor within every culturally significant figure. The identity of the Yongzheng emperor is confused to approach a sort of ubiquity, an imperial version of conquest by integrating the emperor into these varied cultural environments. As the operative of heaven on earth, the emperor describes every perspective as his own, representing them by his very visage.

The Qianlong Emperor in Ceremonial Armor on Horseback

2009-09-13T21:03:00.000-07:00

Castiglione’s portrait of “The Qianlong Emperor in Ceremonial Armor on Horseback” is a perfect example of the Qianlong Emperor’s pursuit to insert himself into art for the sake of legitimizing his rule. While the portrait incorporates some traditional features that would represent a continuity with the past (yellow ceremonial armor and an unbroken view of the Emperor), and simple visual cues to assert his merit for his position (like “The Portrait of the Emperor Troating for Deer”, the ability to “make his steed stand perfectly still…is an effective metaphor for his control over the empire” [Berinstein 176). Yet the Emperor still chooses to be shown with native Manchu accoutrements (a quiver filled with arrows) to preserve military heritage of his people and allows himself to be painted in a Western style that showed a desire to break from the stylistic traditions of his Han predecessors (Berinstein 176).

Comparison of “Western Dress-Portrait” of the Yongzheng Emperor with the costumed “Portrait of John Montagu” (Figures 7, 8 from the Wu Hung)

2009-09-13T18:49:00.000-07:00

(I couldn’t find the images in the database or online, but they are both on Pg. 33 of Wu Hung’s article.)

Although Chinese Western dress portraits and European Oriental-dress portraits are similar at first glance, these two examples imply fundamentally different goals. Wu Hung describes the European example as essentially ‘imperialist,’ which implies an expansion of Western culture to influence, master and own other cultures. Similar to imperial politics, this painting is a cultural conquest. In opposition to that example, the Chinese painting is described as ‘imperial,’ which implies an absorption into, or maintenance of, tradition. Unlike the other portrait, Yongzheng is not masquerading as the other. Instead, he is re-envisioning himself as the ‘One Man Under Heaven,’ by presenting himself as every man. Rather than attempting to possess another culture, the Chinese style uses and assumes a foreign vocabulary as a vessel to reassert and strengthen the emperor’s authority and identity within China.

These approaches to style resonate with Pasztory’s discussion of the ‘Same’ and ‘Other.’ Both of these costume paintings use another culture’s visual language to reaffirm aspects of their own identity. They reinforce Pasztory’s idea that “ethnicity is not static once it is achieved,” it is dependent on continuous interaction and maintenance of boundaries between different groups. Ethnic styles serve as a “strategy for survival” that constantly creates difference, and I think these paintings exemplify that interdependence between cultures that assures the maintenance of the ‘Same’ and ‘Other.’

2009-09-13T17:59:00.000-07:00

Qingming Festival on the River depicts daily life, a panorama of traditional customs. It shows a busy scene, where residents are engaged in bartering, selling and buying and other such productive activities. Nearly everyone is hauling a donkey or carrying a pack. I'm particularly interested in how the Qianlong emperor replicated one such panorama in an actual artificial city, where real people acted out the scenes depicted in the painting. It reminded me of the Petit Trianon at Versailles, where Marie Antoinette hired a whole slew of people to act as idyllic country villagers. The Mountain Village of the Remote North, the "theme park" created by the emperor, indicates that the scenes of the painting are more an idealized idea of town life than a faithful depiction, meant to propagate the vision of healthy, industrious townsfolk, working together. The villagers are diverse and yet homogeneous. They engage in countless different individual activities while clad in different colors, but all seem to blur together in the wider picture of the busy scene.

2009-09-13T16:54:00.000-07:00

Tall trees, layered hills, a winding stone path.
The guides look back, the followers shout out in response.
- Liu Songnian’s depiction of the Eastern Hills
Is remodeled into this painting of imperial enjoyment.

Relaxing in the pavilion over a clear stream,
I hear my alert attendants pass on a message:
‘New royal consorts are arriving!’
- Isn’t this scene better than the picture of Lady Zhaojun leaving China for the north?

Having frequented immortal realms,
Now I just lean against the railing, quiet and relaxed.
Although people’s caps and robes follow the Han style,
What you see are images of deep meaning in a painting.

A waterfall cascaded by my side.
Tame deer beneath cliffs seem to understand my words.
But instead of living like a hermit in deep woods,
I must ensure peace, remember the hardship of my forebears and plan eternity for the kingdom.

-Qianlong

Wu Hung (the author of the article) notes that the Han clothing of the figures are particularly symbolic and reinforcing of the emperor Qianlong’s cultivated image as traditionally Chinese. However, the fact that the painting is a copy of an older imperial painting is of particular interest to me. The artist has painted Qianlong’s face onto the body of the lounging emperor, and this alteration is significant for two reasons, the first of which is that this was fairly standard practice to do so in Qianlong’s court. The second is noted in Qianlong’s own inscription, which remarks on the traditional Chinese dress of the consorts, who in the original painting, would have been approaching a Han emperor. Qianlong asserts himself as the true and legitimate emperor of China by noting that that consorts’ relationship to their emperor is unchanged despite the emperor's foreign origins.

Wu Hung's other comment on the painting regards the emperor's assessment that the painting is "better" than that of Lady Zhaojun, a Chinese court lady, being sent to a foreign emperor. Here, the Chinese ladies are directed inwards, towards their true ruler, Qianlong. In the most physical sense, with the addition of Qianlong's face, he assumes the proper position of the true emperor of China, at the center of the world. The setting of the painting is a private retreat, which, although private, is bridged to "the outside world," allowing for the maintenance of the control and radiation of the emperor's influence by a single channel. The emperor comes to occupy the singular center of China, as all must traverse the bridge as a single point in space to reach him.

Painting Domination

2009-09-13T14:19:00.000-07:00

I found the idea of Qianlong's need to insert himself into chinese art fascinating. The reproduced Chinese paintings that incorporate Qianlong into them appear to be another way for the Qing emperors to exert their power over Chinese culture. Since he is a non-Chinese emperor, it would be important for him to proclaim his absolute control by not only monitoring Chinese style now, but inserting himself into the Chinese past as well. There is a feeling of pre-destination by visually making himself a part of the past.

The clearest example of Qianlong's desire to fully incorperate himself into China's past is the deatil given to us of Lang Shining's Washing the Elephant. Here, not only does Qianlong have the image reproduced, but includes himself in it dressed as a Chinese scholar, and just in case the viewer did not understand this imposing gesture, he adds the original painting into his reproduction. The combination of the chinese costume as well as the painting within a painting makes it clear that Qianlong had to dominate every aspect of Chinese art.

On the subject of cultural identity and differentiation in art

2009-09-13T12:22:00.000-07:00

Esther Pasztory explains that individuals present images of themselves to show how they are separate from their neighbors. Ethnic style is a way of communicating identity and sustaining culture across generations. In the image below we see the emperor Yongzheng battling a tiger.

This image comes from a series that explains a lot about identity. The other images in the series show Yongzheng as a Persian, a Daoist magician, and much more. Each costume change alters the emperors social relations, yet he is still the same man.

We see the emperor depicted in European clothing, in the dress of a Tibetan monk, and that of a Mongol, however, all of these are in Chinese style. The images give us the opportunity to see other cultures through the Chinese eye. We see their attitudes towards other nationalities.

Troating for Deer-Qianlong Emperor, Lang Shining

2009-09-12T06:59:00.000-07:00

Telescope-Science of Vision

The telescope, and the harsh dichotomies represented by it, is one of the weirdest components in the painting. The difference in interpretation between the Qing emperor and the Jesuits is bizarrely different and dramatic.

For Kangxi (Qianlongs grandfather) the telescope and by extension Western science was a way to further Chinese scientific knowledge in order to make China stronger and to eventually be able to resist Western culture --Christian religion.

For the Jesuits the telescope represented Christian culture. They associated clarity of vision offered by the faith with optical precession offered by the telescope. They saw the use of Western technology as a means to introduce Christian religion in China.

The similarities in interpretation for both cultures was based upon an idea of 'clarity of vision' and 'optical precision.' Seeing is understood in terms of ideologies.

With this tool, the emperor's imperial power expanded with his vision. The Jesuits religious strength increased. The amplification of powers was combative.

The political and religious implications of the telescope outweighed the scientific significance and potential of the telescope.

Another component in the painting along very similar lines is the representation of Qianlong in the guise of Constantine, a powerful Western ruler. Qianlong would see the appropriation as a 'symbolic surpassing of his European model' while the Jesuit artists would have interpreted it as a kind of subordination of China to Western/Christian power.

Both examples exaggerate the discord between the two cultures. The Western technique chiaroscuro--contrasting lights and darks to achieve a sense of volume, mirrors the interpretive ideological contrasting of Chinese and Western cultures to achieve a sense of distinct identities.

painting and architecture

2009-09-11T14:40:00.000-07:00

Having now thought about the cellular and modular (and symbolic) construction of the city, a time-honored Chinese construction based on cosmological and geomantic theories, we are going to shift our perspective, to consider how the Forbidden City was pictured by the foreign Manchu court during the last dynasty, the great Qing or "Pure" dynasty (1644-1911).

I cannot access the contentDM image database from off-campus to create a pool of images for you to explore as we get into this work, but I will try to do so this weekend. In the meantime, you might try googling "Guiseppe Castiglione" (aka Lang Shining), an Italian Jesuit court artist, or take a look at some of the image databases linked to my Imperial China webpage.

Have a great weekend,
Lisa

2010 Shanghai World Expo

2009-09-10T16:25:00.000-07:00

Hello all-

For a video presentation on the super event of the World Expo (the contemporary iteration of a World's Fair), click here. Note the picture of the Forbidden City. In an expo that takes place in Shanghai, why include a picture of the Forbidden City?

I've attached an artist's sketch of the China Pavilion and a photograph of its construction.

Cheers,
Lisa

Qiu Anxiong's New Book of Mountains and Seas (2006)

2009-09-09T14:40:00.000-07:00

This is a bit of a cheat, since it's not my drawing, but I think the process of watching the buildings go up in this video work is very interesting. To watch it (in very small format) scroll down to the bottom of this page.

2009-09-08T23:09:00.001-07:00

a very attractive house

2009-09-08T21:58:00.001-07:00

This house is modeled after traditional Chinese temples. The windows employ an hexagonal lattice, while the walls are painted red for permanence and fortitude. There are paintings along the rafters (blue area) bot visible in this image. Preserving the integrity of the flared roofs was very important in capturing the traditional aesthetic. I like living in this house a lot.

The Gate of Highest Elevation

2009-09-08T21:47:00.000-07:00

Step through the gate and reach the Highest Elevation.