The Research On Western Architecture And Its Influence In Modern Fuzhou City (1840-1949)

Throughout Throughout the history of Fuzhou’s urban development,Fuzhou has had a history of more than 2,200 years since the establishment of “Yecheng” in the Han Dynasty.Due to its outstanding natural environment and geographical location,Fuzhou,called “the leader city of the Eight Min cities”,has been the seat of authority for many generations of monarchs and the administrative center city controlled by centralized power,exerting its political and military functions,and reflecting the basic attributes of ancient Chinese traditional cities.Nevertheless,in modern times,Western capitalist commodity economy has poured into Fuzhou city rapidly as a result of the promotion of port and trade openings promoted by the opening of ports and commerce,which has gradually dismembered the feudal natural economy of Fuzhou and enhanced the transformation and development of the city’s emerging commercial economic functions.It has completely disrupted the trajectory of China’s traditional urban development,and gradually compelled ancient traditional Chinese cities to convert into contemporary cities.The spatial pattern and functional zoning of the modern Fuzhou city also have changed quietly under western “external forces”,such as the emergence of the commercial and economic district of Taijiang and the foreign-related cultural district of Cangshan,and the gradual formation of foreigners’ borrowing places,especially the foreigners’ residence in Cangqianshan and the summer resort in Guling,with which different types of western buildings also emerged.These Western buildings are not only the external manifestation of the evolution of the spatial structure of modern Fuzhou city,but also the internal factors of transforming the traditional Fuzhou city into the modern one.In the context of the conflicts and integration of Chinese and Western cultures in modern times,the Western buildings in modern Fuzhou are not only “material media” but also “cultural institutional media” that have influenced the interaction between Chinese and Western social and cultural life,thus promoting the development of the traditional Fuzhou city.With Western architecture as the core of investigation,the paper systematically compares the historical and cultural overview of diverse Western architecture in modern Fuzhou,further elucidating the interaction between the city and architectural characteristics of the times and cultural connotations of Western architecture which is deemed as a comprehensive cohesion of the values of modern Western industrial civilization.More importantly,it explores the amplification and expansion of the symbolic social meaning of “Western architecture”.To be specific,the interaction between the social and cultural practices carried out with Western architecture as the material space carrier and the various fields of the modern Fuzhou society such as adopting Western religious buildings as the material space to carry out social and material practices pertinent to religious culture.Although the missionary work was inevitably accompanied by ideological colonialism and the disadvantages of Western cultural superiority,compared with the backward feudal Fuzhou society,these Western religious architectural culture and social practices objectively had an improving and transforming effect on the old society’s customs and culture,such as the anti-smoking and anti-drug movements,women’s liberation movements,and criticism of bad social habits in modern Fuzhou society.These Western customs offices,consulates,and other living buildings serve as political and economic strongholds of the Western colonial invasion which are dedicated to safeguarding the political,economic,and social rights and interests of foreign merchants and expatriates in “foreign lands”,and have a significant impact on the social and political life and organization of modern Fuzhou.These buildings not only promote the early modernization of the modern Fuzhou management system,but also enhance the development of urban residents’ lifestyles and the emergence of urban entertainment and leisure culture,facilitating the modernization and transformation of modern Fuzhou city.Although modern Western architecture and education culture had significant religious features in their early activities,they gradually“weaken” over time in comparison to old feudal education in Fuzhou.In general,before the modern era,Western architecture and educational culture revolutionized Fuzhou’s conventional feudal educational notions,introducing advanced Western educational technology concepts and curricula.The rise of women education in the church,in particular,ushered in a new era of education in Fuzhou,effectively promoting the transformation of traditional feudal education to modern new education in Fuzhou.Furthermore,the Western publishing and printing institutions undertook missionary work as the “mouthpiece” for the propagation of the spirit of Christ Jesus and became affiliated with the missionary cause.It is true that medical and charitable services,as“handmaidens of the Gospel of Christ” in the early days,were built up under the trend of“religious merit” of Western missionaries and doctors,and became a “door knocker” to win the acceptance and welcome of local people and believers.However,with the adjustment of Christ’s missionary strategies in China at the beginning of the 20 th century,coupled with the professional attributes of medical and charitable work itself,Western medical and charitable work gradually began to operate independently and professionally.The activities of Westerners in the form of medical and philanthropic buildings have promoted the transformation of the local people’s medical concepts,the rise of Western medical cultural education,the revolution of epidemic prevention and public health,and the development of public welfare undertakings.It played a pivotal role in the modernization of medical and charitable services in modern Fuzhou.So far,in the context of Western colonial invasion in the 19 th century,the social and economic growth of contemporary Fuzhou could not escape the fate of Western colonial expansion in addition to the control of culture,spirit and social life.After the opening of trade and commerce,the capital influx from the West entirely destroyed the traditional feudal natural economic development model,and the capitalist commodities economy developed rapidly.It led to the emergence of Western commercial and industrial buildings,as well as foreign companies,stores,banks and factories,all of which controlled the city’s foreign trade and reaped the benefits of its economic development.These Western activities,carried out in the form of commercial and industrial buildings,objectively introduced advanced Western industrial technology and commercial culture concepts,which stimulated the Fuzhou’s commodity economy,gave birth to its modern national industry and commerce,and created a modern urban commercial culture for the transformation and development of Fuzhou.In conclusion,this paper takes the Western architecture in modern Fuzhou as an entry point,explores material functions of different types of Western architecture and the meaning of its social and cultural practices,and investigates the interaction between Western architecture and culture and modern Fuzhou urban society in a specific historical time and space.It aims to probe into the internal and external dynamics of the transformation and development of modern Fuzhou society,thus revealing the influence of Western architecture and culture on laws and characteristics of the city development under the impetus of the though of learning from the West.