Liang Sicheng and Tong Jun surfacing latent positions inherent in their discourse and practice

Abstract

Liang Sicheng, a leading Chinese architect, researched into Chinese ancient architecture. He did research on historical artifacts to obtain a set of formal rules and patterns, giving them the status of knowledge to be learnt by future generations. Lianga??s neutral and detached space of the scientific observation yield epistemological knowledge of the appearances of things. The works of Lianga??s contemporary architect Tong Jun, however, provide another alternative. Tong Juna??s works embody the experiential aspects of architecture, which address one aspect of architecture that contained something ineffable, which sometimes escape description. Most often these aspects that impinge on the body a??pleasea?? without any prior concept. By returning to the two protagonists, the thesis surfaces the latent debate that was unfortunately suspended because of the homogenizing effect of Soviet Realism in the early 1950s. It is by surfacing this difference that one can reconnect with a past that will provide possibilities for the future.