RAS Art Focus

China's Arts and Aesthetics of the Past:

Art & Culture in Jinze

Sunday, 8 September 2024

8:45 am Registration

9:00 am to 4:30 pm

Curated and moderated by RAS Art Focus Convener and Art Historian Julie Chun, we return our gaze to art's history with the launch of the 2024-2025 series China's Arts and Aesthetics of the Past. Please join us for this exciting series as we delve into the material culture of the recent and distant history to assess how objects ranging from imperial patronage to utilitarian handicrafts have shaped China's aesthetics through the ages.

This month, we inaugurate the first of the series by embarking on a full-day art and culture trip to the old town of Jinze with Maxime Tondeur of Explore Beyond China. From our meeting location, a bus will transport us to Jinze to experience the local canal-side life that is free from mass-tourism as we discover the town's imperial origins and its revolutionary past as a working water town. On our morning walk, we will cross a not-so-traditional bridge, learn about the foreign influences in the Jiangnan area, walk into a Qing era merchant's house, view the 1950's architecture and discover why this canal town still remains not-as-developed as other touristy water towns.

After a local lunch, we will tour the private Jin Ze Art Centre (JZAC), dedicated to documenting and preserving traditional arts and handicrafts with Harrison Sainz, the lead curator and godson of the co-founder Bing How Mui. Sainz will provide an introduction of the art centre with a special viewing of Qixi embroidery and Song Dynasty literature to help us better understand their quest to preserve and protect traditional arts for today's Chinese society as well as for the future. (Depending on the availability of residing student artists, we might be able to visit one of the preservation workshops dedicated to traditional art and crafts sponsored by the art center.)

Afterwards, we will round off our visit to a reconstructed merchant's house that is over 200 years from Jiangxi and a former boat construction site repurposed into a market area.

*Spaces are limited to 20 members and nonmembers total on a first come first serve basis. So, please sign up early. Thank you.

MEETING LOCATION:

No. 99 Huichuan Road

长宁区汇川路99号

METRO INFO: Zhongshan Park subway station (line 2), exit 7

RETURNING LOCATION:

No. 808 Kaixuan Road

长宁区凯旋路808号