EACS-2016. Book of Abstracts

Section 7 21st Biennial Conference of the European Association for Chinese Studies 79 power shifts over three continents, and by Western struggles to conceptualize unfamiliar objects according to Renaissance ideals of artistic merit. Hirth became best known as an art historian and collector during his years at Columbia University in New York City (1903–1907), where he was exposed to surging interest in new museum building and a flourishing commercial market. By comparing the fortunes of his collection and supporting scholarship with those of contemporaries Ernest Fenollosa and John Ferguson , this paper engages with early 20th century interface between power politics, museum building, commerce and public taste. By looking at a selection of Hirth's painting collection still in private hands today, we can imagine a story of changing viewership over 150 years. Guo Qiuzi (Heidelberg University) Self and Other — Intersection of Identity, Subjectivity and Modernity in Pu Yi's photography Key words: Photography, identity, modernity, subjectivity, visual culture What happens when a visual medium of modernity encounters the changeless imperial palace? The surviv- ing photographs taken in the Forbidden City in the early twentieth century provide an interesting context for interpreting the refracted visual modernity in China. The last Chinese Emperor Pu Yi took great amounts of photos in the Forbidden City in his youth. My paper will explore PuYi’s attempts on photography from three parts: The first part is the Pursuit of a Modern Self. There are many photographs in which Pu Yi performed in distinct costumes: court costumes, western suit, even military uniform in Republican army. These photos showed PuYi’s attempts to transcend the identity and get rid of the image of feudal imperial emperor, which not only challenged the old pictorial framework based on feudal hierarchy, but also indicated the independ- ence of a modern subject that had the ability to control and shape self-image. The tension between modern and tradition made Pu Yi fall in a dilemma of self-identity. The second part is Escaping from the “Other”. For a long time photography had been represented as external gaze, which provided the possibility to shape Chinese’s image that fitted in the framework of Chinese “national character”. In these early photographs people as the object being viewed were lack of self identity and self consciousness. Chinese as an “other” were being viewed and consumed. But Pu Yi’s photographs suggest a new trend: Chinese people gradually used the visual technology to shape the image by themselves. The third part is everyday life in the motion. Some of Pu Yi’s photos reflects the everyday life in the Forbidden City with the Kodak folding camera after 1911—the end of Qing Dynasty. The movement and stillness in a historical context formed a tension between old and new, modern and tradition. His photographs indicate the coming of a reproduction era and his exploration could be regarded as the initiation of modern photography in China. Hein Anke (Oxford University), Kost Catrin (LMU Munich) Yunnan-Steppe Relations: Old Questions, New Data Key words: Yunnan-Steppe relations, cultural contacts, material culture, GIS, least-cost-path Connections betweenYunnan and the northern Chinese Steppe have been postulated at least since the 1950s when the Dian-culture Shizhaishan cemetery was discovered in Yunnan. Date from the 5th c. BC to the 2nd c. AD, the objects found there indeed display some technical and stylistic similarities with objects common to the mobile-pastoralist groups of the steppe. The evidence hitherto analysed, however, is rather scarce and has not been used to reflect upon the mechanism of exchange. Recent years have furthermore seen a large number of new discoveries that can help to throw new light on the old questions of Yunnan-steppe exchange. The aim of this paper is thus twofold: On the one hand it will revisit the hypothesis that Yunnan and the Steppe were connected, thereby also drawing upon newer excavated material from the rim of the Tibetan Plateau. In doing so, we will also ask the question whether an exchange between Southwest China and the Northern Chinese Steppe started much earlier than the 5th c. BC. On the other hand, we will intertwine our analysis of excavated materials with newer archaeological theories and methods, such as various types of spatial analysis (e. g., least-cost-path) but also ethnographic examples to reflect upon the mechanism and routes of exchange.