The exhibition "Centennial Dialogue on Modern Chinese Architecture" entered the University of Pennsylvania

Fridric Stanai, dean of the Wetsman School of Design at the University of Pennsylvania, was interviewed. People's Daily reporter Li Xiaohong photographed

People's Daily New York, March 9 (Reporter Li Xiaohong) "Five years later, we intend to award Lin Huiyin a bachelor of fine arts degree on the 100th anniversary of the University of Pennsylvania, and grant her a bachelor's degree in architecture to realize her long-cherished wish." A few days ago, at the opening ceremony of the exhibition "Built in China: A Century of Dialogue on Modern Architecture" held at the University of Pennsylvania, Frederick Steiner, dean of the Stuart Wetsman School of Design, said.

The Department of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania is the cradle of China's modern architecture pioneers, and lin Huiyin, Liang Sicheng, Yang Tingbao, Tong Jun and other industry masters are from this. In order to commemorate the centenary relationship between Penn and Chinese architecture, the Weitzmann School of Design, Together with Southeast University of China and Tongji University, jointly held the "China Construction" exhibition at Penn University, showing the development and evolution of Chinese architecture in the past century since the first generation of modern architects in China since the Beginning of the Year since the First Generation of Modern Architects in China.

The founder of modern Chinese architecture

This is lin Huiyin's transcript of the elective architecture course at Penn University that year. "Unlike today, the letter D on that year's transcript represents that she was rated 'excellent' in these classes." Steiner said that when Lin Huiyin entered Penn in 1924, architecture did not recruit girls, so he registered in the fine arts department. However, she took most of the courses in architecture, and the credits met the graduation requirements of the major.

In the exhibition, the student status information, transcripts, design drawings, competition award briefings, graduation books, and photos of the masquerade balls preserved by the Penn University Architectural Archives nearly 100 years ago are clear and complete, vividly telling the story of their studies in that year.

At the beginning of the 20th century, Penn's architecture department, which was the leading american university, attracted students from all over the world like a magnet. According to statistics, between 1919 and 1934, 25 Chinese students studied architecture at Penn. Most of them are hard-working, and some of them are very good at school. For example, there is a 1925 Philadelphia Bulletin in the exhibition, which has an article reporting the story of Yang Tingbao, a student at Penn who won the most awards in a personal architecture competition at that time.

According to reports, after the return of these people, they not only laid the foundation for China's modern architectural education, rushed to the excavation and protection of material heritage, but also became the backbone of modern architectural practice. On the one hand, they developed the traditional Buza system Chinese and helped modernism to sprout in China, and on the other hand, they explored the integration of Western design ideas with Chinese local culture in construction practice, making a foundational contribution to the development of China's modern construction industry.

The interweaving and evolution of "modernity" and "locality"

Over the past one hundred years, Modern Chinese architecture has continued to develop in dialogue with the international community and in its own practice. Accordingly, the exhibition narrates from the two temporal dimensions of "history" and "contemporary".

"The public impression is that the buildings on the Bund in Shanghai are all designed by foreigners, but this is not the case. The Bank of China building next to the Peace Hotel is the work of penn students after returning home in the early days. Exhibition curator Anderson Lin Zhongjie, associate professor of urban and regional planning at Penn's Weitzman School of Design, said.

Displayed in the history section of the Penn Architecture Archives, it highlights the architectural practices of early Chinese architecture graduates after their return to China. After returning to China, they did more than 600 works, including a large number of modern buildings on Sichuan Road and Jiangxi Road behind the Bund complex in Shanghai. This exhibition features 22 architectural projects they have been designing since the 1920s. "Lin Zhongjie said that these works reflect their understanding of the international trends of the time and their thinking on the urban design of developing China." How to absorb the nourishment of traditional culture and integrate it into the creation of modern architecture has attracted attention from the first generation of Chinese architects. ”

This model of combining Chinese and Western dialogue and self-development continues in contemporary Chinese architecture, manifesting itself as the interweaving and evolution of modernity and locality. This is also the theme that runs through the entire exhibition. Lin Zhongjie said that to this end, we adopt the perspective of "dialogue" to set up the exhibition, and strive to tell the century-old attempts and efforts made by Chinese architects to explore the expression of modern architecture with Chinese characteristics through the dialogue between China and the West, the dialogue between generations and contemporaries presented by different eras and different creations.

The "Contemporary" section on display at the Penn Fisher Art Library features the designs of two outstanding representatives of returnees and localists, contemporary architects and educators Zhang Yonghe and Wang Shu. From museums to artists' studios, from university campuses to village renovation projects, through the comparison of six works, large, medium, and small, the audience sees that in the context of a regional culture, a new generation of Chinese architects have seen the ideals of contemporary Chinese society contained in their works from different perspectives on the balance of modernity and locality.

"Looking forward to more exchanges and cooperation"

On the occasion of the opening of the exhibition, Penn University's Weitzman School of Design invited alumni Yonghe Zhang to give an academic lecture at the Fisher Art Library. That night, the severe cold of the heavy snow outside was in sharp contrast with the explosion of the indoor speech scene. "What ignites people's hearts is not only the academic spark they transmit, but also their strong social responsibility." Penn University architecture phD student Shang Qiran, who came to listen to the lecture, said.

"That's what we're doing with this exhibition." Tong Ming, curator of the exhibition and professor at the School of Architecture of Southeast University, said that from a professional level, the exhibition is to trace the source. Both architects and practitioners are not very clear about the roots and context of their profession, and there are some shortcomings. "A generation has a generation's challenge, but each generation needs to draw nourishment from the roots of the past and refine its own coping tools. Tracing is to do a good job in the present. ”

"From a social perspective, the more important contribution of the first generation of Chinese students at Penn is to establish China's own modern architectural education system and cultivate follow-up talents for China." Tong Ming said that their emphasis on the excavation and protection of architectural heritage was something that many architects and planners in the United States at the time were unaware of, and inspired their American counterparts.

"In the architectural practice of Yang Tingbao and others, we can see their attention to public affairs, and this spirit is still passed down in today's Weitzman School of Design, which has been shared by professors to the students of the School of Design." Stannai said, "This is a quality we look forward to seeing from our own students. ”

"Today, there are about 100 Chinese students out of more than 700 students in Penn's design department, which further enhances our connection with China." Stanai admits that we have close ties with Chinese universities, especially Tongji and Tsinghua University. In 2018, we co-hosted a conference called "Beautiful China" with Tsinghua University, and we published a book on this topic in the early days of the epidemic.

Speaking of the construction of ecological civilization, Steiner said that responding to climate change is the most urgent environmental issue in the world at present, and China has made positive efforts to reduce carbon emissions and advocate the construction of "sponge cities". It is expected that there will be more exchanges and cooperation with China in academic research and talent training, and jointly promote the construction of environmentally friendly and energy-saving green buildings.