The Shanghai Ningbo-provincials Association And The Art Exhibitions In The Republic Of China

After the opening of Shanghai,many emerging cultural industries have been derived from the Chinese and Western cultures integration.The art exhibition industry is one of them.With the development of Shanghai’s economy and the increasing demand for cultural consumption from all classes of society,the art exhibition combines the characteristics of traditional elegant gatherings,western salons,and commercial expositions.The art exhibition industry not only has been forming a unique feature of "exhibition and sales model" but also has been emerging many "art exhibition spaces" for lending venues.From 1922 to 1948,the Shanghai Ningbo-Provincials Association has held no less than 403 exhibitions in these 27 years.However,as an exhibition that most hold in Shanghai during the time of the Republic of China,and with the longest history,it was rarely studied in the history of art in the Republic of China.As the earliest new type of townsmen association in the Republic of China,the Shanghai Ningbo-Provincials Association may seem irrelevant to the art exhibition industry at first glance.The purpose of this study is to explore the connections between them.This study focuses on the Shanghai Ningbo-Provincials Association’s art exhibitions.We explore them from five perspectives with a systematical literature review: the art exhibitions in the Republic of China,the external and internal space of the Shanghai Ningbo-Provincials Association,the interpersonal relationship between the Shanghai Ningbo-Provincials Association and the Shanghai Calligraphy and Painting Circle,the characteristics of the townsmen associations in the Republic of China,and the art exhibition cases.