The practice of practices: Chinese independent architectural design from 1949


Ye, Nan (2021) The practice of practices: Chinese independent architectural design from 1949. PhD thesis, University of Liverpool.

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Abstract

Chinese private architects’ offices first appeared in the 1920s. After establishing the People’s Republic of China [PRC] in 1949, the government banned private architects’ firms and merged architects into state-owned design organisations. Since its establishment in the 1950s, China’s architectural design institute system has become the dominant architectural design industry in the country. It was not until the Economic Reform and Opening-up in 1978 that individual-led architectural design firms were allowed to reopen. These newly emerged practices with the intention to realise unique ideas in their architectural design were regarded as independent practices. With over three decades of development since the 1980s, Chinese independent architectural practices lacked a systematic review in contemporary Chinese architectural history. Most research focused on their built works without noticing the dilemma they confronted in practice. The research systematically reviews China’s independent practices from 1949 to the 2000s, discussing the triggers behind their disappearance in the 1950s and their re-emergence after the reform and opening up. Given that the history of Chinese independent architectural practices is nonlinear with sporadic emergence at the beginning, the research applies Michel Foucault’s genealogical method in reviewing the history. Focusing on the mutual production of “power” and “knowledge”, the research examines the various restricting and promoting powers around architects’ practice and the knowledge generated by these powers. Based on Ian Bentley’s opportunity space theory, the research also establishes a new conceptual framework to reflect the relationship between practice patterns and architectural forms, discussing the independence in cases of architectural practices in different periods. The research also analyses the interactive relationship between independent practices and the broader industry to re-understand the current condition in China’s architectural design industry.

Item Type: Thesis (PhD)
Uncontrolled Keywords: Chinese architectural design, independent architectural practices, power and knowledge, opportunity space
Divisions: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences > School of the Arts
Depositing User: Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited: 06 Sep 2022 10:09
Last Modified: 18 Jan 2023 21:03
DOI: 10.17638/03154505
Supervisors:
URI: https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3154505
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