The field and the approach
This research proposal set out to investigate the construction and use of images with a particular focus on the field of architecture and related visual media production in contemporary China. The intention is to study the presence and proliferation of images, within a specific structure of the visual domain, not merely as a system of signs and codes, but which also carries significant physical implications in social and cultural practices. This research aims to come to terms with characteristics of this structure of the domain of visualisation specific to the current Chinese context by approaching issues of the construction of the effect, the iconic presence and conceptual content, the emergence of a pattern of image-making that establishes a consistency of ideology and cultural enterprise, and the transition technique from virtual imagery to material decisions. This research has been prompted by the problem of the lack of appropriate theoretical and instrumental framework of knowledge in apprehending the current phenomenal growth and transformation in the field of architecture and urbanism in China during the past two decades. Thus the thesis sets up a critical perspective based on the proposed investigation on the role of images as a device to address aspects within the current phenomenon, which have been overlooked because they are not recognised and do not readily fit into the projection of the assumed framework based predominantly on established western trends of thinking. Taking this as a point of departure, the research further identifies and explores distinct characteristics of development within the Chinese context as conditioned by the construction and use of images, ranging from the reality-fiction imaged in the collage process in the practice of design, the systematic visualisation of the hybrid as a possible emergence of originality, and the image-driven priorities in the decision-making and representation process.
Key topics and strategy
The initial part of this research examines key figures in the practice and discourse on contemporary architecture in China from two critical perspectives: firstly, the perspective of the West in framing the Chinese phenomenon as exemplified by architects from Europe and America involved with projects in contemporary China; secondly, the conflicting views from architects and critics within China caught between the eager embrace of western modernisation progress and the appropriation of such dominant influence within cultural production and ideological changes aligning with Chinese identity. Under this problematic dichotomy of the east and the west, this part reveals contradictions and misinterpretations within the established intellectual framework in dealing with the Chinese phenomenon and highlights problematic terms and ideas, which in turn formulate critical issues to guide the process of fieldwork and analysis in the following part.
The main body of fieldwork research consists of collecting and working through stocks of images that are produced, presented and/or circulated in various realms of architectural activities within China, gathered from architectural education, professional practices to governmental sources and those exposed in public media. Selection is based on the criteria that these images are used with a clear intention to engage and persuade its audience and reflect a pattern of expectation from its cultural context, such as instances in architectural competitions and publications of architects' works. Analyses on the these images and their circumstances of emergence focus on questions of technique of constructing and presenting such images in relation to a specific set of agenda of intentional effect, content, audience and material implications. Types of images could be of different media ranging from architectural renderings, paintings, photographs, photomontages and virtual simulations, and these images need not relate directly to an architectural construct and could have been originated from the local context or from foreign sources. Based on the proposition that there are essential differences in the relation between the image and people in society when dealing with changes in cultural contexts, the study on these stocks of images aim to establish distinctive characteristics of the domain of visualisation within China and implications in the physical transformations that are taking place.
The above evidences in turn support the clarification of specificities of the role of images in the context of architecture in China, and this research further proposes to open up the question of potential adjacencies across cultural contexts by exposing discussions on the role of images in different historical periods and geographical locations. Phenomena in contemporary China is not studied in isolation as a unique instance of architectural development, but breaks away from the limits of given cultural boundaries and to acknowledge possibilities of parallels, similarities or overlaps across different historical and social conditions. Key criteria are based on conditions in which the production and perception of images take on a primary role as a vehicle sustaining the generation, transformation and transmittance of ideas and knowledge. Potential topics have been identified as follow: the projective nature of the concept from the subjective to the universal traces back to a long tradition of landscape painting in Chinese history, the dominance of an establish pattern of exemplar imageries relate back to early European travellers' accounts and illustrations from Asia in the thirteenth century, the iconic presence of an image further involves discussions on iconography and paintings from the Byzantine period, and so on. The task of weaving together explorations on the image, the imaged and the imaginative gives grounds to the formulation of critical strategies and theoretical framework to address issues pertinent to the understanding and the outlook of rapidly changing situations in Chinese in relation to the rest of the world.
Theoretical framework
The question of the emergence of a pattern of images is explored by using notions within the structuralist debate, as exemplified by writings by Foucault and Barthes, on issues of representation, the sign, the language of images and the discursive formation of knowledge. The analysis of the construction of the effect, the intention and the presence, makes reference to Kant's theory on aesthetics and universal subjectivity, and Deleuze's concept of the diagrammatic on the pictorial plane. Issues of the conceptual, the event-programme and the movement-image are discussed in conjunction with the architectural agenda of the deconstructivist output, with figures such as Koolhaas and Tschumi. Critical studies on recent Chinese theories of aesthetics and the idea-realm conception of the image starts from writings by art historians and theorists from the latter half of the twentieth century such as Zong Bai-hua and Li Ze-hou, which further points to sources of theories on landscape painting from Five Dynasties period: Jing Hao and Dong Yuan between the ninth and tenth century. On the issue of 'Chineseness' as a visual form of identity, design statements and publications from contemporary Chinese architects are explored in conjunction with emergent interests in phenomenology, classical idea of mimesis, and the post-modern experience of movement-image.
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Doreen Bernath|