Metaphor and Ritual-orientation
Reconstruction of Anchor Points under Historical Misreading
Bachelor's Thesis: Whampoa Foreign Trade History Museumn
Advisor: Yu Wang
Prize - 2021 Guangdong University of Technology's Outstanding Bachelor's Thesis
Toolkits - Rhino, Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator
Year 2021
Exhibition - GDUT Excellent Guaduation Thesis Exhibition 2022 The Seventh Future Exhibition
Retreat to the Great Indoors.
Culture of Interitory.
Observing, comparing and combing the history of Guangzhou's foreign trade with the ancient port of Huangpu as the core and the history of Western development will reveal an interesting contradiction between Chinese and Western views, the so-called historical duality. In a broad sense, we can regard the foreigner district and the main urban area of Guangzhou as two cities, and the foreigner district itself is the part of the two cities that completely overlap in the geographical sense.
The two cities have independent sovereignty and politics in this area. Autonomy takes the thirteenth line period as the main time slice. Due to the Qing Dynasty's policy of shutting down the country and one-port-for-trade, there are considerable limitations between the two cities, forming a kind of mirror image of urban breathing.
This concept of mirror images that are AB angles to each other is quite interesting. Different people live in different cities, and people belonging to different cities belong to the same city in a geographical sense, but the interaction between the two is completely unequal. relationship.
Taking the Opium War as the boundary point, a complete reversal occurred between the two sides: the predatory and anti-predatory trade between A and B.
My architectural scene chooses the intersection of the two cities that cannot be separated: the port. For the two overlapping cities, the port acts as Copula Hall, a transitional area from one city to another. In real life, every country and city has its own border. In this scenario, the port has become the border or transitional area of the two cities in a broad sense. No matter how the relationship between the cities changes, the port will be a kind of The unchanging posture exists in it.
Trying to understand the history of the port from the perspective of a novel, we can look up the terms used to define the clues used in the plot from the index of this novel. My intuition is that if we don't use a bunch of textbook explanations, but use some absurd ways to define, the theme can also convey something with more depth and meaning. Under this deliberate misunderstanding, the relationship between history and the city can be viewed in an alternative way: people in the two cities have selective defaults to each other, which is a response to training under the system. Passing through the port, passing through Copula Hall, may return to the original street but already belong to another city, or come to a different street in the original city.
Under such an absurd interpretation, the port has become a customs between the two cities. Passengers and pedestrians who come and go change their roles here, which belong to the vision and image of the previous city, and gradually fade out after stepping into another city. This selective default of vision requires acquired training, and tourists who come to settle or travel to these two sites need to undergo special training.
After categorizing and misreading, understanding the meaning in history is like the index and description of a novel, showing the relevant storyline through logic and icons. At this time, we will not have to quote obscure historical texts or esoteric doctrines.
After setting aside or even overhead history, recontrasting this setting with the history of this area, although the concept of a port has been blurred, it is undeniable that this setting does have merits.
After the corresponding translation, I tried to redefine the nature of the port space: introducing the concept of a floating city to define ships on the Pearl River, we can re-divide the foreigner area and the Chinese area, which can be more clearly separated The two cities and under this definition, the port has a market nature; and separately delineated into the original foreigner area, the port becomes a one-way blockade of customs for foreigner activities. No matter how we define the scope of the foreigner area, the port is always a transitional space between the two cities. It is like the only constant element in the distorted form of transactions between two cities and two countries. And this absurd, dark, and even cruel form of transaction is not only the state of the city, but also the state of the people living in the city.
Just like people, the characteristics of multiple personalities can also be applied to cities.
Returning to the real timeline, the city and the city overlap in this area in a one-way time. Although we step into the same place, we cannot see the scene of another city we are also blocked by time.
‘China designed cities as separate environments, demarcating different areas for different purposes. The government was often in the center of the city, facing the south and facing the people. The wide boulevard separated the residential areas from each other, and these residential areas often have gates. There were bazaars in the inner city, but many commercial activities took place outside the city walls. The city docks built on the rivers, clusters of ships docked, ranging from small sampans to big sailboats, and merchants rushed for business between the river and the city walls. Guangzhou’s foreigner area was located between the city wall and the river, harmoniously integrated into the typical southern urban planning of China.'
——— Peter Perdue
Monolith + Water
The first feature of the Monolith is displayed in its relationship with water. This idea is followed throughout the development of the entire project, in all scales, situations and programs, including the actual building of the Monolith.
Monolith + Trade
The second fundamental concept is trading in The Monolith which is also derived from the idea of relocation. This chapter identifies the rules played exactly the role of border in history. According to historical facts, before the Opium War, this so called great trade history was nothing more than an unequal predatory trade carried out by China against the West by virtue of its trade surplus and local policies.
Monolith + Transition
Having previously noted that the Monolith is a project on water that holds both history and reality, the third and last notion disgussed in the present chapter is about transition. It's reasonable to consider the area of the site as a transition area in both history and novel ways as it played the roles of central market along with copula hall.Out of a tribute to Raphael’s expression of the functionality of space in the "Academy of Athens", this chapter aims to explore how Transition Space can be used as a platform for disseminating information, facilitating gathering, and generating dialogue.
