The Shaxi Rehabilitation Project as an Opportunity in Monument Preservation A Western perspective under Chinese cultural conditions

I .Preliminary Remarks II .Geographical situa- – from Switzerland to tion of the Shaxi valleys in the province of Yun- In 2002 I took part in a joint Swiss-Chi- nan nese project in Province near Shaxi lies in western Yunnan near the . The Shaxi Project is somewhat Yangtze River () of a role model for China in that there in Jianchuan County (Dali Autonomous are similar rural cultural landscapes Prefecture) between Lijiang and Dali with intact villages and traditional struc- Old Town. The Bai are the dominant tures which would be of value to retain ethnic group in this area with some Yi as complete units and to develop further. living here as well. It is an ideal loca- tion for the development of soft tourism As a large country in which agriculture such as the Shaxi Rehabilitation Project, still has an important place in the econ- which is attempting to set up a frame- omy, it is worthwhile to develop spatial work for long-term development of the planning. Different from the booming Shaxi Valley. cities of China where development threatens to make a city burst at the III. Partners in the Shaxi seams, basic planning could be under- Project: Chinese-Swiss taken in heritage villages creating a sus- tainable environment for residents for cooperation future generations and should include In 2000, experts from the Institute of a regulated and logical preservation of Spatial Planning and Landscape Devel- the overall situation. Particular attention opment (IRL) of the Swiss Institute of should be paid to raising the living stan- Technology (ETH) were invited by the dards of the local community. Jianchuan County government of the

9 of Dali under the Zurich- sister state/city partnership to identify development possibilities for these administrative districts. The ETH-Institute initiated the “Shaxi Rehabilitation Project” (SRP) for the socio-economic development of the Shaxi Valley in Jianchuan County. In 2001, the World Monument Fund placed Shaxi Valley on the list of the hundred most endangered cultural properties of the world and financial support for the project was promised. From the beginning the conceptual study for the Shaxi Rehabilitation Proj- IV .The conceptual part ect was based on a vision and cultural of the Shaxi Project assessment of the historic trade route from Yunnan to Tibet (Tea and Horse An analysis of existing problems which Caravan Trail) which is of enormous needed to be addressed in the project re- importance in the history of China. The sulted in the following subsections: Shaxi Project is only a small mosaic 1.Marketplace restoration (Preserva- stone in the larger concept of a “Re- tion of the building structures of the gional Heritage Route” in Yunnan. historical marketplace and its setting in Sideng) 2.Village preservation

Photographs are provided by the authors. 10 V .The results of the res- toration of the Sib Denx Marketplace in Shaxi Sideng lies picturesquely on the main river of the valley and can be reached by a beautiful, arched bridge. The vil- lage settlement is largely intact. Its layout is in the form of a closed village with a southern entrance gate and nar- row, interconnected clay houses which are grouped around an old, picturesque square. This market place gives way to 3.Sustainable development of the valley the Xingjiao temple and a Ming dynasty (Further economic development of the (1368-1644) theater stage. Many of the Shaxi Valley with agriculture and soft older houses have facade paintings and tourism. Preservation of the landscape carving. The restoration and reconstruc- and surrounding setting in Shaxi Valley tion measures were showing how a fun- and soft development.) damental, forward-looking concept for the development of regional communi- 4.Ecological sanitation (Improving sani- ties can be implemented. tation with ecological compatibility) During my time as a guest on the project 5.Poverty alleviation (Taking into con- I could see how my Chinese colleagues sideration the requirements of the popu- and administration representatives react- lation) ed to our proposals. The western prin- 6.Events and dissemination (Promulga- ciple of monument preservation states tion experience, planning, and technical that where no earlier condition is known know-how which was gained in this it is better to retain the present one. But project.) after a long time researching conserva- tion in China and after becoming more familiar with Chinese culture, I finally understood what the Nara Document on Authenticity in1994 means for Asian cultures. For Asians, ‘there are no fixed criteria to judge value and authenticity of a cultural property; rather it must be appraised within the cultural context to which it belongs’. My most interesting experiences in the Shaxi Project were with the use of historic building craftsmanship and

11 materials. During restoration only tradi- tional techniques were used, including the erection of walls with air dried clay bricks, the manufacturing of roof tiles, facade plasterwork using lime, carpen- try techniques for the repair of existing wood structures, stone masonry work for the foundations, plastering and his- torical painting techniques for the resto- ration of historic fresco paintings. IV .Conclusion The Shaxi Rehabilitation Project (SRP) has received several international cita- tions including the World Monument Fund (2004) and UNESCO (2005 Asia- Pacific Heritage Award for Cultural Heritage Conservation). The SRP was cited by an international organization as setting a new technical and social benchmark for the implementation of sustainable monument preservation ac- tivities in the Dali Region of the Prov- ince of Yunnan (China).

Dr. Christian RENFER Born in 1943, he studied Architectural History, History, and Ethnography in Zurich and Vienna, with a dissertation on Zurich Farm House in 1973. From 1995 to 2005, he was the Leading Monument Maintenance Director of the Canton of Zurich. Since retirement from civil service in 2006, he become a Federal Monument Maintenance Expert on behalf of the Swiss Federal Department of Culture, and worked extensively with Chinese universities including Tsinghua, Tongji, SEU and Taipei.

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