Associate Professor Shuishan Yu reported out from the second week of the China Dialogue. Students are experiencing the art and architecture first hand and have managed to cover a lot of ground in a very short time.

This week, students visited went to Tiananmen Square, Changan Avenue, and the Forbidden City, focusing on the study of imperial palace architecture.

 Students made the trek to the  Summer Palace, ast ensemble of lakes, gardens and palaces in Beijing to view examples of  imperial garden architecture. Famous for Chinese landscape garden design, the Summer Palace was included on UNESCO’s World Heritage list.

They also had the chance to  visit the largest state owned design institute, the China Architecture Design and Research Group and compare the differences in design culture between China and the west.

Things got more interactive when we had a traditional theater demonstration at an actors studio. Student learned some basic stage actions and had an impromptu concert from the actress leading the workshop.

 

Islamic Chinese architecture and guqin were the topics of more formal lectures, which were followed by a night out. The students experiences traditional theater and saw two famous performances of Beijing Opera