Shang Dong Xia Yu -- Five Schools Joint Exhibition of Historical Building Surveying

Author: Editorial Committee of "Joint Exhibition of Five Universities on Historical Building Surveying"
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2006-05-26
Features: As revealed by the title, this book is compiled from the content of the "Joint Exhibition of Five Universities on Historical Building Surveying," jointly organized by the School of Architecture at Tsinghua University, the School of Architecture at Tianjin University, the School of Archaeology and Museum Studies at Peking University, the School of Architecture at Southeast University, and the School of Architecture and Urban Planning at Tongji University (in the order of their participation in the exhibition preparation) in 2004. This exhibition, entirely featuring historical building surveying and research achievements, is the first of its kind since the founding of the nation. It was initially initiated by the School of Architecture at Tianjin University and the School of Architecture at Tsinghua University. Inheriting the long-standing tradition of regular exchanges between students of the two institutions, they decided to hold a surveying results exhibition between the two universities immediately after the surveying practice in autumn 2004, aiming to enhance teaching and academic exchanges in architectural history and ancient building surveying, foster mutual understanding, share resources, and achieve common progress. During the preparation of the exhibition, the School of Archaeology at Peking University, the School of Architecture at Southeast University, and the School of Architecture and Urban Planning at Tongji University joined one after another, expanding the participating institutions from two to five, and the exhibition was finally named the "Joint Exhibition of Five Universities on Historical Building Surveying." Among the five universities, four architecture schools have a surveying tradition of over half a century, and surveying-based courses have always been compulsory major courses in architecture departments of these four schools and some other universities. This exhibition featured 60 display boards, showcasing more than 400 historical building surveying drawings drawn by students from the five universities over the years. The drawing techniques and methods, including pencil, ink pen lines, Chinese painting, ink wash rendering, watercolor rendering, computer-aided design, and model making, have made the drawings themselves valuable artifacts. The surveying subjects ranged from the Northern Wei, Five Dynasties, Liao, and Song Dynasty structures to the Qing Dynasty, Republican era historical sites, spanning over a millennium. They included magnificent structures such as the Hall of Supreme Harmony and the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvest in the Forbidden City of Beijing, the Royal Three Great Halls of the Ming Changling Mausoleum, as well as delicate and sentimental ones like the numerous scholar's gardens in the Jiangnan region. The surveying covered village houses, Buddhist temples, grottoes, floating pagodas, stone inscriptions, and stone beams, encompassing a wide variety of examples of traditional Chinese architecture in terms of rank, style, and purpose, displaying a dazzling and colorful array. The surveying efforts of the five universities have nearly covered all provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities in China, and they have even ventured overseas to Africa. This book is divided into five parts, including contributions from the School of Architecture at Tsinghua University, the School of Archaeology and Museum Studies at Peking University, the School of Architecture at Tianjin University, etc.