"Making and Breaking Space"
Kristin Bayer
New York University
Mapping for the Emperor: Competing Images of Imperial Space in Qing China (1644-1911)
In the 17th and 18th centuries, Qing emperors commissioned several maps that reflected an image of the empire that, rather than accurately depicting geographic reality, served a geomantic purpose that helped both to legitimate the emperor and to distinguish his reign from those of previous Qing emperors or other dynasties.
In this paper, after discussing the complicated question of what constituted a map in Qing China, I use two topographical paintings that served as maps to analyze dynastic and imperial rivalry and their projections of power and continuity. I examine how traditional Chinese, Western Jesuit, and Manchu cartographic practices transformed the production of maps and affected imperial power and its representations. Both the Qianlong and Kangxi emperors sought to present Qing power and surveillance in cartographic representations of the empire. By placing these images within the context of political and cultural history, art history, geography and cartography, I argue that the Qianlong emperor used these maps to display power as a subtle way of contrasting his reign to that of his grandfather, the Kangxi emperor. This reveals the complex relationship between dynastic rivalry and the demands of filial piety.
My first painting, by Leng Mei, is intended as a commemoration of the Kangxi emperor's sixtieth birthday and depicts the imperial palace at the summer capital of Chengde during Kangxi's reign (1662-1722). The second painting, by Xu Yang, portrays Beijing during Qianlong's reign (1736-1795) and was painted in 1770, probably to mark the New Year. Both these paintings were court-commissioned representations of seats of power and both were topographical, but Leng Mei's resembles a carefully planned landscape while Xu Yang's resembles a modern map. What distinguishes these maps from one another is their cartographical style, which I argue intimately reflects the intended interpretation of these ideological constructions of power.
Earl S. Tai
Columbia University
Travels Through Space and Time: An Alternate Mode of Perspective in the Chinese Context
Much has been written in the field of Chinese art to explain why the methods of perspective and representation in the Chinese painting tradition vary so greatly from western post-Renaissance methods for describing "realism". Most explanations propose that the intention of the Chinese painter was not simply to capture a visual image of the object, but also its "spiritual qualities." Such arguments, based on naive readings of such theoretical works as Hsieh Ho's late fifth century work, Six Principles of Paining, appear to be culturally sensitive, but actually continue to be bound by the projection of western concepts of "realism". In order to navigate around such "perception politics," the fundamental underlying premise that the western system of perspective is an absolute standard, must be brought to question. This premise unnecessarily subjects any discourse on "realism" to the standards of vanishing point perspective from a single, stationary vantage point which holds such a revered position in the western tradition.
I propose that there was a way of perceiving the physical environment unique to the Chinese cultural tradition which played a strong influence on the representation of space in literature and painting. Through analysis of techniques of representation in Lo Shen Fu T'u and Ch'ing Ming Shang Ho T'u, a link is demonstrated between the representation of space in handscroll paintings of the landscape genre and the representation of space in landscape literature. Furthermore, it is proposed that these literature and painting traditions were strongly influenced by such things as ancient
shamanistic spiritual rites. Not only does this study seek to clarify the representational aims of early landscape writers and painters and describe the unique relationship between painting and literature in Chinese history, it also gives some insight as to how the people of early Sung and pre-Sung China may have experienced and perceived the world around them.
Ted Mack
Columbia University
Privacy in the Public Arena: Fictional Space in Natsume Sôseki and Uno Kôji
The titles of both Natsume Sôseki's "Garasudo no uchi" ("Within these Glass Doors," published in Asahi Shinbun in 1915) and Uno Kôji's "Yume miru heya" ("Rooms for Dreaming," published in Chuakaron in 1922) refer to private places of retreat: the "Glass Doors" are those of Soseki's shosai (private study), while Uno's "Rooms for Dreaming" are his varied sanctuaries. Most of the characters' actions and most of the stories' events transpire within these private places to which the narrators retreat in order to meditate upon their experiences and write. Despite being the background, however, these settings are not inanimate, ahistorical vacuums divorced from the narratives own social contexts. As a result, these spaces are anything but open playgrounds for the unobstructed exercise of the narrators' volition.
If we shift focus away from the series of events which make up Sôseki's and Uno's stories, and direct it at the spaces in which these events occur, we bring into relief an array of forces. The central contested physical space of the narratives is the private space in which they write, which in turn are microcosms reflecting larger spheres beyond, whether they be contiguous rooms, Taishô Tokyo, or wartime Europe. Through a careful analysis of space in both works many social forces become apparent, allowing an exploration of the textured environment within which the narrators (and narratives) exist.
Entering into the spaces of both authors' textual production, we see their stake in appropriating space on the page and in the arena of ideas reflected by the stake the narrators have in guarding their rooms. The two authors, Uno and Sôseki, are trying to define textual and literary spaces of their own, large enough for the articulation of their private voices, while negotiating constantly with the textual and literary spaces around them. Social power and material realities simultaneously act as external pressures on this agenda, creating obstacles to the fortification of their private spaces. In this way, the contested physical space of the narratives acts as a symbol for literary space in which to be heard. In "Garasudo no uchi" and "Yume miru heya," then, can be found the private spaces of the historical Sôseki and Uno and the corresponding private spaces of their fictive narrators.