Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures, tables, and illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- Note on Romanization
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Revisiting the Historical Trajectories of Modern Art Museums in China
- 3 He Xiangning Art Museum in Shenzhen
- 4 Guangdong Times Museum in Guangzhou
- 5 Hong Kong Museum of Art in Hong Kong
- 6 Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - Introduction
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 November 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures, tables, and illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- Note on Romanization
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Revisiting the Historical Trajectories of Modern Art Museums in China
- 3 He Xiangning Art Museum in Shenzhen
- 4 Guangdong Times Museum in Guangzhou
- 5 Hong Kong Museum of Art in Hong Kong
- 6 Conclusion
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Abstract
The museum enterprise in China has long been seen as a state monopoly. This chapter finds that the contingent roles of the state and the market, the agencies of social and cultural actors in their signifying practices, as well as the notion of museum public, have been neglected in the existing analyses of museums in China. By drawing the constructive, multidimensional model, ‘museum circuit’, it argues that the study of China's museums should incorporate reflection upon institutional-regulatory changes, processes of cultural production by networks of museum intermediaries, and processes of museum consumption as practices of appropriation, negotiation, or resistance. Based on the model, it suggests an empirical study of the art museal processes that have affected GPRD since the 1990s.
Keywords: Museum studies, China studies, museum circuit, museum public, museal processes
Public museums first appeared in Western European countries in the late eighteenth century against a background of European colonial expansion and the emergence of democratic societies in Europe. Although these public museums in Europe and their counterparts in North America set important museological precedents that have had a global impact, museums in other countries have had different trajectories due to the specific historical, social, and cultural backgrounds against which those museums emerged. In Asia and the Pacific, museums are engaged with postcolonial critiques and state-building projects (see for examples, Macleod 1998; Kreps 2003; Vickers 2007; Lepawsky 2008; Bhatti 2012; Lu 2014; Mathur and Singh 2015; Erskine- Loftus et al. 2016). The museum, as a locus of production, circulation, and consumption of visual culture, has emerged as a state tool of nationalism and has been adopted as a vehicle of modernization in the postcolonial countries in Asia. Their distinctive local discourses have challenged the validity of treating museums with a universal discourse that is epistemologically and ontologically the same as Western counterparts. In the twenty-first century, Asian museums are urged to establish their own museologies, aligning the efforts of the West in ‘decolonizing’ the Eurocentric museum. Museums across the world have become an academic issue that emphasizes global dialogues, cultural specificity, and the need to focus on particular contexts.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Museum Processes in ChinaThe Institutional Regulation, Production and Consumption of the Art Museums in the Greater Pearl River Delta Region, pp. 13 - 62Publisher: Amsterdam University PressPrint publication year: 2019