The China Academy of Art – connections to Western Europe – histories of modernism

Researcher: Prof. Dr. Juliane Noth

The China Academy of Art in Hangzhou was founded in 1928 as a National Academy of Arts. The project will study how the French-trained faculty adapted the Beaux-Arts model to the Chinese situation, how they interpreted European and Chinese art histories, and how their work can be traced through later generations teaching at various art schools. A special focus will be on modernist practices. CAA also has a strong tradition in Chinese ink painting, especially under the directorship of Pan Tianshou (1897–1971, director 1944–1947 and 1959–1967). This case study will serve to analyse how artists working in modernist or traditionalist styles navigated the political and institutional changes brought about by the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) or the implementation of the Soviet system in the 1950s. It will trace curricular, personal, and artistic continuities from the Republican era into the late twentieth century, but also disruptions and debates.