STYLISTIC OR TECTONIC? Historiography Revaluate the Interpretations of Chinese Wooden Architecture from James Fergusson to Liang Sicheng

http://www.paper.edu.cn STYLISTIC OR TECTONIC? Historiography Revaluate the Interpretations of Chinese Wooden Architecture from James Fergusson to Liang Sicheng Zhao Chen Abstract: Chinese wooden architecture has been major of Chinese architectural culture, while how to interpret this special featured architecture in the World had been puzzled the Western architectural historians especially in the end of 19th Century to the beginning of 20th Century, such as Sir. James Fergusson and Sir. Banister Fletcher. With the opposite view politically, Chinese architectural historians, such as Liang Sicheng, started to make their interpretations for Chinese wooden architecture, which delivered the birth of the written history of Chinese architecture. Nevertheless, we can see today the view of architecture that Chinese historians applied to interpret Chinese wooden architecture had been confined by Classicism, which produced inescapable contradiction. Key words: Chinese wooden architecture, Stylistic, Classic, Liang Sicheng Introduction: About Chinese Wooden Architecture and Interpretations From whatever the views, we always have seen that wooden structured architecture is the major system in Chinese architectural culture along the recorded history of Chinese civilization (at least three thousand years). There is already enough evidence about how great a quantity and rich usage all over the great country and along historic development. With cultural influence and exchange, wooden architecture was the major architectural system not only in China, but also mainly in East and Southeast Asia, specifically Japan and Korea. The main system of Chinese wooden architecture is the wooden framed structure system, or the frame bearing structure. It has been described many times in the Modern Architecture, as “organic”; “skeleton and skin”; also many modern architects in the West were fascinated by it, since they found there has been strong logic related between Modern Architecture and the ancient architectural contributions of East Asia. As a major architectural system in Chinese architectural culture, it has been developed so early, and according to some historiography treatise it even “reached its ‘adolescence’ in the Han dynasty (around the beginning of the Christian era).”1 The most amazing feature of this system is that it reached its "matured" stage in Tang and Song dynasty (around the 600 A. D. to 1000 A. D.), and did not change the features of this major system, disregarding some modifications in detailed construction. Some issue has been debating from very beginning time when historians attempted to interpret this system, such as, why Chinese architecture has been built coherently in wood? Or, the same question in the other way; why didn’t the Chinese develop stone structured architecture as in other cultures? However, architectural historians have to be confined by certain view of culture and methodology historically or regionally. Today, the main system of historiography about Chinese architecture has been established by the first generation of Chinese architectural historians, and represented by eminent Liang Sicheng (1901-1972). It was the clear political issue, as the result of inspiration of the researches from the foreigners, for Chinese historians to interpret Chinese architecture by themselves in the beginning of the last Century. While Liang’s interpretation was strongly influenced by his time the Western historians with the architectural view of Classicism, typically Sir. James Fergusson and Sir. Banister Fletcher. It is very interesting to review and revaluate Liang’s interpretations of Chinese wooden architecture with comparison to Fergusson and Fletcher. Interpretations: James Fergusson and Banister Fletcher as Typical View of Western Architectural Historians in Colonial/Imperial Times The long history of searching for eastern culture from the west, could be dated early to Maco Polo in 13 century or even earlier in Roman of the First Century, Chinese architecture was combined with other features of Chinese culture, introduced more or less in a mystical way, so to speak “the vision of Cathey”. While we still can see the “Chinoiserie” from the Seventeenth to Eighteenth Century in Europe, was the first time for the Westerns to materially introduce and imitate Chinese architecture was introduced and in Europe. 1 Liang Sicheng: A pictorial History of Chinese Architecture: A Study of the Development of Its Structural System and the Evolution of Its Types, Edited by Wilma Fairbank, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. 1984 1 http://www.paper.edu.cn Nevertheless, it was based upon romanticism to imitate Chinese architecture with imaginary picturesque, and with mysteries. By knowing more about Chinese architectural culture, the general publications about the history of architecture started to add in their new additions also eastern traditions including the Chinese. James Fergusson had firstly dominated Chinese architecture as part of Eastern architecture in his “History of Architecture”. Yet at the same time he was uncertain about Chinese architecture since very little information has been available to him. His expression of surprise about the absence of monuments in Chinese architecture, especially in comparison to Egyptian, was typical of an European with a classical view of architecture at the end of the Nineteenth Century (Figure 1): “Notwithstanding all this, it certainly is curious to find the oldest civilized people now existing on the face of the globe almost wholly without monuments to record the past, or any desire to convey to posterity a worthy idea of their present greatness. It is no less remarkable to find the most populous of nations, a nation in which millions are always seeking employment, never thinking of any of those higher modes of expression which would serve as a means of multiplying occupation, and which elevate while feeding the masses; and still more startling to find wealth, such as the Chinese possess, never invested in self-glorification, by individuals erecting for themselves monuments which shall astonish their contemporaries, and hand down their names to posterity.” 2 If we understand his point of view as a result of limited knowledge or information, his observation is more or less correct. He expressed many times such observations in his chapter about Chinese architecture. It is very interesting to look at his interpretation today; actually it is not difficult to understand him, since we notice the ignorance of Chinese culture, and the restricted view of architecture available to him as a European in middle of 19 Century. Predominantly, Sir. Banister Fletcher’s “A History of Architecture”, edited and revised more than twenty times till 1996, had a strong influence on architectural research and education. The changing versions of the book, show clearly how the West changed its view of architecture in the World from the end of last century till to now3. The descriptions and explanations of Chinese architecture put into the fourth version in 1901, were categorized as non-European architecture with the general title of “The Non-Historical Styles”. Combined with the famous “Tree of Architecture” (Figure 2), which was used as a fundamental description of historical evolution of architecture in the World, Chinese architecture is the same as Japanese, Arabic, etc. all put into the branches. Obviously the main evolution of Europe was expressed with the trunk. Sir. Banister Fletcher represented a view of architecture based upon classicism. With this interpretation of “The Non- Historical Styles” and “Tree of Architecture”, Fletcher became also a typical representative of colonialism in architectural historians. It is not difficult to see Fletcher’s classicism and colonialism with his written comment to “The Non-Historical Styles” as follows: “These non-historical styles can scarcely be as interesting from an architect’s point of view as those of Europe, which have progressed by the successive solution of constructive problems, resolutely met and overcome; for in the East decorative schemes seem generally to have outweighed all other considerations, and in this would appear to lie the main essential differences between Historical and Non-Historical architecture.”4 This was often criticized afterwards by many scholars from Western and Eastern. Ito Chuta, the most important architectural historian of Japan, made his complaining on it at the beginning of 20th Century. However it was not really reacted by the realm of architectural theory. On the 17th Edition of “Fletcher’s History of Architecture” in 1961, responded editor Prof. R. A. Cordingley gave up Fletcher’s concepts on architectural culture of the World, used “Architecture in the East” to instead of “Non-Historical Architecture”, and “Ancient Architecture and the Western Succession” to instead of “Historical Architecture”. He explained that: “The further general heading (The Non-Historical Styles) for Part II was 2 James Fergusson: History of Architecture in All Countries, from the earliest times to the present day, London, 1865. Vol. II, Part III, Bk. VII, Ch. I, P. 736 3 Sir. Banister Fletcher’s “A History of Architecture, on the Comparative Method for the Student Craftsman, and Amateur”, firstly published in 1896, edited to third version in 1897, which didn’t concern anything about Chinese as well as Eastern architecture. From fourth version in 1901 to sixteenth version in 1954, two parts of “Historical Architecture” and “Non-Historical Architecture” were embodied;

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