Study On Tusi’s Garden Construction And Gardening Views In Western Hunan And Hubei During Ming And Qing Dynasty

The communities of Tujia national area in western Hunan and Hubei, which geographically beyond to Wuling mountain area, has a long history. After the establishment of Tusi regimen, to serve the Tusi better, the Tusi landscape architecture was formed. However, we have seldom done basic research on this type of landscape architecture. With no theory conducted or criteria evaluated, it is really impossible for us to protect and develop Tusi landscape architecture, not to mention the rebuild of it. Under such circumstance, and from the angle of landscape architecture’s contemporary history, my research is trying to explore the landscape architecture practices in different kinds of Tusi Gardens, to conclude its scenery skills and the characters of this genre, and to deeply interpret the Tusi’s desire for the gardening which was influenced by the idea of garden construction. The research was carried out by the means of my thoroughly reading of related papers, history data, and the site survey of existing gardens built in the period of Tusi.First of all, I defined and analyzed the research related subject and concept, and I also give a brief introduction of the natural and social background where Tusi landscape architecture was formed. Then, after taken into the Chinese classic garden’s taxonomy into consideration, I divided Tusi landscape architecture into three different types:private villas of tusi family、 religious gardens and scenic spot in countryside. The main point of this paper starts from chapter3, which can fall into two parts. The first part is primarily about the discussion of different types of the gardening practices of Tusi landscape architecture in western Hunan and Hubei, including the conclusion of typical gardening activities and the analysis of its gardening techniques and characters. In part two, based on the comprehension of those gardening practices, I unveiled the related views and values hiding behind those Tusi landscape architecture regarding the natural and social conditions of the day. Furthermore, the gardening expression outside of those views and values had been interpreted.According to above study, it is found that Tusi landscape architecture maintains nature and homely styles on the whole. The garden was located and constructed to conforming topography and combined with diversiform constitutive elements such as real hills, water, buildings and plants. At the same time, Tusi focused on creating realm of emotion and scenery by scenery-borrowing and scenery-bedecking. On the other hand, the nature view, culture, and aesthetic standards Tusi had, make Tusi landscape architecture present obvious national characteristics.