Along with the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, China entered into a modernizing era as it settled its century-long movement of reinventing the authority of modernization. As a newly-founded nation-state, China initiated a new development course for its art system, too. Many disciplines, including museology, began its professionalization process. This article is meant to analyze the founding and developing course of museology in China following the foundation of the PRC, and discuss the originality of Chinese museology developed under the political system and academic research context at that time.
A glimpse of the National Art Museum of China during its construction, 1960
1. Museum and science: the Soviet Union’s influence on Chinese museology
The development of Chinese museology wasn’t based on western museology. The special historical and political context resulted in the special forming of Chinese museology compared to other regions of the world. For the development of China’s cultural disciplines after 1949, the most important was the founding of the Ministry of Culture. Its duty lies in “leading the cultural work in the whole country” [1]. After the Ministry of Culture was founded, along with the improvement of cultural system and academic disciplines, the ministry had gone through multiple internal structural adjustments. The department most relevant with museum was the Cultural Heritage Administration, which coordinated museum-related works across the nation, and guided the development of museology in China [2].
In 1951, following the central government’s new “retrenching and economizing” requirement, the Ministry of Culture combined the Cultural Heritage Administration and Science Popularization Administration into the Culture Management Bureau. The combination looked like a simple structural adjustment, but it actually reflected the development of disciplines, and most importantly understanding of museology at the time. Museology had been developing slowly before 1949, mostly depending on the academic self-consciousness of ordinary people.
Basics of the Soviet Museology, translated and published by the Antique Publishing House
After 1949, Chinese museology entered into a new stage. Its theoretical system was developed based on the Soviet museology, combined with the social context of China at the time. During the cold war, the Soviet Union developed a socialist museological system different from the one used in Europe and America. This article won’t focus on the comparison between the two systems, although I need to point out that the two systems had completely different understandings of museological purposes. Soviet museologists thought of ideological influence as the most important in museological research. In 1955, the book Basics of the Soviet Museology was published. It summarized museological researches in the Soviet Union after the October Revolution. It applied Marxist theories into museological concepts, used Marxist philosophies into museological practices. The preface of the book wrote:
"The scale of public political and cultural education is increasing in China. All cultural institutions, including museums, are an active part of it. They all perform their duties of enhancing cultural levels of Chinese people and educating people with communist ideology.” [3]
Likewise, museums were categorized as cultural institutions in the Soviet Union. Moreover, the mission of museums was explicitly stipulated, which was to “enhance cultural levels of Chinese people” and “educate people with communist ideology”. In this perspective, museums were not only an institution about cultural heritage, but also a publicity institution. However, it’s a mistake to only think of museums as a publicity tool. The establishment of cultural institutions had complex reasons:
“…the problem is not the scale of cultural education. The central mission of cultural institutions is still to enhance the ideological and theoretical levels, and to continue fighting for profound publicity of scientific theories and creativity in science education.
…although the work content, scale, structure, nature and staff of Soviet museums are different from each other, they are subject to a unified system of science education and research, and share the same science educational mission. Certainly, many other cultural institutions apart from museums take part in science education in the Soviet Union.” [4]
It’s clear that an important reason of establishing museums is to conduct scientific researches. There were many important museums in the Soviet Union. [5] As Soviet museologists saw it, the recurring theme of researches and exhibitions at these institutions was science education. They even called museums “science education institutions”. Overruled by such a theme, it’s natural that the Cultural Heritage Administration and Science Popularization Administration were merged in China.
National Art Exhibition, 1962
2. From professional to disciplinary: the systematic foundation of museology
Based on an established system, all disciplines were progressing towards a more detailed, professional direction. The Ministry of Culture pushed forward the development of museology step by step. First, it clarified the work content distinction between cultural centers and museums, assigning the former with publicity work and the latter scientific research. Second, the Ministry established a museum study committee to improve the professional skills of museum staff. The committee was composed of the Palace Museum, the history museum, the military museum of revolution, and even the natural history museum. Third, the Ministry separated the library volume from the the Cultural Heritage References, which means that the magazine became a specialized magazine under the museological system. This both benefitted museology and library science. They look like three simple steps but it took three years to execute them. Through these three steps, the duties of museum became clearer, and museology in China was thus more developed.
In 1956, the Ministry of Culture convened a national museum conference. The conference had great impact on the museology after 1949. In the opening speech, Zheng Zhenduo said that the conference was aimed at solving the problem of how to improve scientific research work in museums. [6] Wang Yeqiu, head of the Cultural Heritage Administration at the time, made a report titled “On developing museum works, serving scientific research and the Chinese public” [7]. Over 110 people, from directors of national museums, experts to chiefs and sub chiefs of provincial and municipal bureaus of culture, and archaeologists, participated in the conference.
The conference can be seen as a watershed in Chinese museology. Museums in China entered into a stage of scientific and professional development after that, with division of work between different museums becoming clearer. Different from the mission of “serving ideology” in the last stage, museums began to have more research-related functions apart from ideological education, and each focused more on a specific research field. In 1957, the Ministry of Culture held an internal meeting, during which they discussed the respective nature, disciplines and mission of the Palace Museum, the Natural History Museum and the Military Museum of Chinese People’s Revolution. By refining museums’ functions, they guided museological research in China into a more professional direction.
3. From collection to exhibition: the originality of Chinese art museums and art museology
Under the guidance of the systematical strategy and political policies, the museological research in China began its new chapter. Following the founding of the PRC, the methods and system of museological studies were changed. The mainstream of the studies turned from the European and American museology to the Soviet museology. Chinese museology after 1949 completely imitated the theoretical system and methodology of the Soviet museology. The book Basics of the Soviet Museology mentioned above was the museological classic written by the Soviet Museological Research Institute, which introduced Marxism into museum concepts. In the 1957, the book was translated and published by the Antique Publishing House [8], and became the must-read among museum professionals in China. In the same year, Fu Zhenlun compiled Outline of Museology [9]. The book borrowed its structure from Basics of the Soviet Museology, and made some adjustments according to China's special context, for example it required the museums to “serve the politics, serve the production”, and emphasized the “scientific, national and public cultural educational function” of the museums.
Outline of Museology, published by the Commercial Press
Although there was no concept of “art museology” or even “art museum” at the time, but from the history of museology we can see, the difference between “museum” and “art museum” was huge. This is utmost important for us to understand the establishment of art museology in China. In the system of Soviet museology, “collection” was very important, and was regarded as “the foundation of museum’s all activities”:
“The foundation of museum’s all activities was composed of objects in the museum. The sum total of the objects is the collection of a museum. The collecting work of the museum is first and foremost targeted at museum’s collection (objects). Without objects there won’t be museum, and without exhibition of objects there won’t be exhibitions at a museum. And exhibition will thus lose its meaning, function and distinction. The museum collection (objects) is the foundation on which museums educate the public through its exhibitions. Museum education has direct link with scientific research and exhibition of the original archive within the museum, which makes public education in the museum distinct from other public education in the club, cultural palace or library.” [10]
We know from here that although the cultural center administrated by the Cultural Heritage Administration had exhibiting function, it mainly provided an exhibition space, and was more open to different themes of exhibitions. But museum exhibitions mainly focus on museum collections. In the perspective of Soviet experts, museums should have very rigorous attitude towards collections. They criticized that the work and characters of museums “are still generated from its cultural education missions (those same to all cultural education institutions and irrelevant to museum characters) till now. That is to say that museum’s missions should lie in its own exhibitions, from which different aspects of social and natural development could be reflected. However, what materials should be used in the exhibitions to reflect certain issues still remain an unsolved problem.” They believed that museum professionals didn’t focus on the special character of museum work. And the character of museum, as they maintained, was “to generate the conditions for people to understand objects, which can rarely or impossibly be seen outside the museum, in a direct and perceptual manner.” And such conditions are “established according to scientific collection and exhibition methods. Through collection, preservation and exhibition of these objects (which are the original source of knowledge), the character and existential meaning of museums are found.”
Group photo of China Artists Association and staff members of the National Art Museum of China, 1966
This means that museum professionals should collect and exhibit collected works according to scientific principles, and conduct research on the works. The exhibition in museums was targeted at collected works, which was completely different from “expo”:
“Expo is an important form of the museum’s public political education. It has two forms: fixed and circulating. Although some fixed expos are held in museums, they are essentially different from museum exhibitions.” [11]
We could thus know that the concept of “expo” was linked with the concept of “temporary” and “uncertain”. “Fixed expos are not to be archived into collection and never be shown again, but to be restructured and brought into regular exhibitions.” [12] This means that expo is a part of research. “Museums might be using the expos as a means to flexibly reflect the most important political events or contemporary realities. It’s a basic skill for every museum to hold expos, especially circulating expos. Through expos museums could disseminate political and scientific knowledge. Expo is a powerful tool of direct publicity.” [13]
It is clear to see the influence of Soviet museology on the establishment of the Chinese concept of art museum and the Chinese “museology”. Looking back at the construction of art museums at that time, we would discover that there was no consciousness of building “modern art museums”. Under the uniform arrangement of the Ministry of Culture, the Palace Museum was in charge of collecting and researching ancient culture and art, but modern or contemporary artworks couldn’t get the chance to enter the “collection” of museums. Modern art expo was only part of the job of museums, and even an insignificant part under the research perspective of museology at that time. Holding “expos” was never the aim or mission of museums.
Under the national art system and the disciplinary guidance at that time, it was not art museum that China lacked, but a fixed, national museum built for exhibitions of artworks. At the time, art museums were rather “art expos” instead of professional art museums. It was an important premise for studying Chinese art museology and New Museology. Art museums in China originated from the transformation of state policies and political system. They were endowed with fixed and important public functions right after they were established. In the discourse space of the new era, whether Chinese art museums have been separated from the “expo” context still remains a question. How to expand its dimensions, and breathe new life into our time with new perspectives and practices while leading to new reflections and criticism, should be the center issues that New Museology scholars should discuss.
(Written by Xu Mengke, PhD in Art Theory, Central Academy of Fine Arts, assistant researcher at the National Art Museum of China, freelance critic.)
References:
1 Structure of Ministry of Culture of the People’s Republic of China and Directory of Cadres, 1949.11 - 2010.06, compiled and printed by the Human Resource Department and the Party History Data Collection Committee of the Ministry of Culture, published and distributed internally by the Culture Art Publishing House.
2 The Structural Principles of the Ministry of Culture of the Central Government, stipulated and published by the Ministry in February, 1950, made clear that the Cultural Heritage Administration should be in charge of cultural heritage, museum and library across the country, and required the Cultural Heritage Administration to “administrate and guide national libraries and museums” and “construct and establish libraries and museums of important historical, cultural or revolutionary values.”
3 Soviet Museological Research Institute, Basics of the Soviet Museology [M], translated and published by the Antique Publishing House, 1957.
4 Ibid.
5 The Soviet Union had set up a broad range of museums, including memorial halls of celebrities, such as the Lenin Museum; revolution memorial museums such as the Soviet Museum of the Revolution; history museums such as the National History Museum, the State Russian Museum; and even art museums: the State Tretyakov Gallery and the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts.
6 Zheng Zhenduo, Summary Report of the National Museum Conference (Outline) [J], Cultural Heritage, 1956 (6): 10-12.
7 Wang Yeqiu, On Developing Museum Works, Serving Scientific Research and the Chinese Public!: Speech at the National Museum Conference [J], Cultural Heritage, 1956 (6): 4-9.
8 Soviet Museological Research Institute, Basics of the Soviet Museology [M], translated and published by the Antique Publishing House, 1957.
9 Fu Zhenlun, Outline of Museology [M], Commercial Press, 1957.
10 Soviet Museological Research Institute, Basics of the Soviet Museology [M], translated and published by the Antique Publishing House, 1957, p33.
11 Ibid., p187.
12 Ibid., p418.
13 Ibid., p194.
