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74 74. CHina. People’s Meeting Place. [People’s Republic of China, c. 1959]. £1,400
oblong folio (405 x 560 mm). 20 colour photographs mounted at large and housed in a maroon leatherette box, the lid of the box decorated in blind with foliate borders enclosing chinese characters lettered in gilt, with an introduction card in chinese; some light rubbing and bumping to box edges and very slight cockling where pictures have been mounted but otherwise a very good set.
the great hall of the People is one of the ten great Buildings – ten public buildings built in Bejing in 1959 as part of the great leap Forward celebrating the tenth anniversary of the People’s republic. the great hall was designed by Zhang Bo and covers 171,800 square metres (1,849,239 sq ft). the hall is on the Western edge of tiananmen square and is used for legislative and ceremonial functions including serving as china’s parliament building.
the architecture of the ten great Buildings was a composite of factors, including modernism, communism, and historicism. chinese architecture at that time was shaped by a mixture of its own historical models and external influences. Debate over the ‘national style’ was vigorous prior to the hall’s construction, a period when history, modernity and influence were being conceptualized and reconsidered. the hall attempts to achieve this ‘national style’ without the use of the traditional large curved roof (identified by Professor liang si-cheng as a central feature of the style) and echoes a Western composition through colonnades, whilst being decorated with chinese details. one aspect of the decoration in the great hall was the correlation of rooms for representatives from each province with regional art by artists from these respective provinces and some of these different meeting rooms are shown in the pictures in this set.
the pictures show the scope of the hall, demonstrating the opulence and epic nature of the main rooms contrasted with the plainer auditoriums. the main rooms of the hall ably demonstrate the sheer scale of the building. the great auditorium is the most impressive room with seating for 10, 000 representatives. its ceiling is dramatically decorated with the large red star of the Party surrounded by a pattern of waves representing the people. the state Banquet hall is similarly huge, being able to entertain 5000 diners at one time. all of the rooms show a mix of modernist design with traditional chinese fittings – particularly interesting considering the Party’s efforts to erase chinese cultural history in exchange for an onward ideological movement.
this collection as a whole highlights the use of architecture by governments to demonstrate power and was clearly intended as a propaganda piece to impress the world with the scale of the country’s vision. the photographs are an important look at how the government were trying to portray themselves dynamically and how architecture played a central role in their efforts.
75. CHUrCHill, sir Winston. King george Vi. the Prime Minister’s Broadcast. The Times Publishing Company. thursday, February 7, 1952.
£248
8vo., pp.4, sometime bound in russet morocco backed cloth boards, with gilt rules and lettered in gilt on upper board, marbled endpapers, a very good copy.
First edition of the Prime Minister’s Broadcast on the death of george Vi. Woods A135(a).
76. GilBert, martin. churchill. a life. William Heinemann, 1991.
£98 8vo, original boards, in dust-jacket; a near fine copy.
First edition inscribed by the author “to Dick Du Vivier with the author’s kind regards Martin gilbert. london 18th March 1991”.
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