The Style and Characteristics of Flower-and-Bird Painting in The Western Fujian Province in Modern Times

The 20th century was a period of change in the development of Chinese flower-and-bird painting. Traditional brush and ink painting blended with Western painting colors and concepts to present new forms of painting. Following the peak of Ming and Qing Dynasties’ development in Minxi (the western of Fujian) painting, a group of freehand flower-and-bird painters represented by the “four Masters of Shanghang” Li Shaoqi, Luo Xiaofan, Qiu Tian, and Song Shengyu, who inherited the Minxi painting style of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, learned the new painting language combines the styles of Paintings of Shanghai school, Lingnanism, and Lingdongism. The unique new style of painting highlights the posture of Minxi flower-and-bird paintings, thus influencing the modern times changes of flower-and-bird paintings of Fujian.

The Evolution of a Consolidated Market for Neo-Traditional Chinese Contemporary Art

The purpose of this paper is to determine whether there is an incipient market in China strong enough to replace the global market for Chinese contemporary art. The (informal) market I have identified supports traditional methods of transaction and practice. It charts a course twixt slavish emulation of the past and unqualified acceptance of the present. To demonstrate the contemporary application of this trend, I introduce three case studies, which examine the attitude and behaviour of three Chinese artists active between 2005 and 2015. This period marks the transformation of China from an aspirant economic power to a self-confident advocate of Chinese values. The premise of this paper is that the China market today is moving towards a harmonious ideal rooted in Chinese thought. In the nineteenth-century art movement known as the Shanghai School, I have found a precedent for the evolutionary transformation of Chinese art from the traditional to the modern. This study will reveal how the Shanghai School market might be an exemplar for today’s Chinese contemporary art market. I will refer to this historical model to show how conventional methods of creation, distribution and consumption can effectively be modernised. Another effort to culturally transform China was attempted a generation later in the southern city of Guangzhou. The movement, known as the Lingnan School, attempted to fuse Western-style realism with Chinese techniques and media. I argue that these two early attempts to amalgamate the traditional with the modern failed to metamorphose into a consolidated Chinese contemporary art market model. They have, instead, resulted in the co-existence of two corrupted models; the one, a diffident fusion of the past and the modern world, and the other a concerted alliance of nationalism and globalism.

Shanghai School (Haipai): Content of the Concept

The article is devoted to the analysis of the content of the literary concept of haipai (Shanghai school). It is pointed out that the term is actively used in modern literary studies in the Chinese language and is a basic concept for the classification of Chinese writers of the twentieth century. The question is raised about the legality of using this term for the analysis of works of art. It is noted that the literary polemic of 1933—1934 “The dispute about the Shanghai and Beijing schools” helps to clarify the meaning of the concept of “haipai”. As a result of the analysis of publications of this period, it is concluded that the term Shanghai school in modern literary practice has a different meaning than what the participants in the discussion put into it. The novelty of the research lies in the fact that for the first time in Russian the literary polemics of 1933—1934 are described in detail using primary sources. As a result of the study, it was concluded that in terms of its content, the term haipai is close to such a descriptive concept in European literary criticism as “decadence”. It sets a certain evaluative paradigm and evokes certain visual and sensory images, but it should be used with caution as a means of literary analysis.

Teachers as reform leaders in Chinese schools

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to analyze the influence of teacher leadership on the enactment of educational reforms in southeastern China. It considers how the work of middle and teacher leaders in schools is structured to support reform enactment at the school level. Design/methodology/approach The research was conducted in three case study sites in one school district in Shenzhen, China. Low, moderate and high academic achieving schools which had engaged teacher leaders in instructional reforms were selected. A combined total of 34 senior, middle and teacher leaders participated in semi-structured interviews, which were analyzed through a comparative coding process. Findings Across the three schools, teacher leaders without positional authority strongly influenced the instructional reforms. Their influence was strongest when bolstered by a combination of formal recognition systems, opportunities to lead projects that were directly related to the reform efforts, and mentorship systems that skilled novice teachers in reform-related skills and experienced teachers in leading reform enactment. Mechanisms and structures embedded in schools, when coherently focused on selected reforms, supported the efficacy of teachers without formal authority. And, middle leaders’ impact was enhanced when working collaboratively with formal and teacher leaders. Originality/value This research yields insight on teacher leaders’ influence of reform. It considers how the work of middle and teacher leaders can be structured as a collective that impacts on reform enactment at the school level. And, it illuminates teacher leadership in a Chinese context other than the scrutinized Shanghai school system.

Introduction

This chapter provides an introduction to Xu Xu and Wumingshi and covers the book’s structure and methodology. It critiques the various terms that are used in both English and Chinese studies to categorise popular Chinese literature in the Republican period and it discusses the basis of the established divide between elite “new literature” (xin wenxue) and the much-castigated popular literature in China. It is argued that the term “Shanghai School” (haipai), a concept covering Shanghai popular literature from the 1920s to the 1940s, is too broad to be useful in analysing literature from this period or distinguishing between literary trends. The chapter also contains an extensive literature review, covering both English and Chinese works as they pertain to this study.

The Shanghai Painted Fan

Addresses Shanghai painting through the fashionable painted fan. Often overlooked because of its modest size and ambitions, the fan’s identity as a mobile image and object of self-adornment boosted its popularity in late Qing Shanghai, appealing to consumer tastes for flamboyant display and conspicuous consumption. This chapter examines the ways in which the painted fan embodied Shanghai School painting through the use of popular subjects, dynamic styles and compositions, and its fusion of accessory and artwork. The fan is also examined as a fashionable and sought-after commodity, retailed and distributed through Shanghai’s glamorous fan and letter-paper shops, contributing to the growth of the city’s vigorous art market for an urban middle-class clientele.