The public sphere in Guangzhou from the late Qing dynasty to the early republican period--the News Illustrated as the case study

• Main Authors: Fang, Sheng-Jung, 方笙容
• Other Authors: Chiang, Po-Shin
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2011
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/78677731334951502755

碩士 === 國立臺南藝術大學 === 藝術史學系藝術史與藝術評論碩士班 === 99 === In 1904, when “treaty between U.S. and China on the Limitation on Chinese Workers to Protect the Chinese Living in America” reached to the end of its 10 years term, tens of thousands of the Chinese living in America started to write petition for the termination on the treaty, but only to see their government being denied by the American government and forced to make another renewal. It stirred up the patriotic spirits among Chinese citizens, and gave birth to the background in which the publication News Illustrated was created.Put together by a group of Chinese patriots and published in Guangzhou, where the first wave of the cultural impacts made its way to the Chinese soil, News Illustrated gradually rose up to become the primary medium for a time of anti-US movement by sending out news and ideas on revolution. The publication was written and edited by people promoting revolution who also worked as artists in Guangzhou. It made its first print in 1905 as a quarterly publication and was shut down temporally in 1910, followed by its republication later on with a different title Citizen News Illustrated, which met its end 1913. News Illustrated, with its chief editor Pan Da-Wei, who created the publication to reach inside people’s heart for revolution, carried a few missions: 1. Disseminating local news in Cantonese or other local dialects, making it easier to approach the public to rally up their patriotism and nurture a space for localism to expand in Guangzhou; 2. Using illustrations to tell stories, making arts accessible and understandable to general public and expanding the revolution ideas from the mere political realm to the art circle; 3. Changing the editorial layout in 1907, inserting a photograph in front or at the back of the introduction page on every issue. The photo mainly depicted the local events, news, and people, enriching the storytelling and the visual senses, creating an imaginary path through the photo to the real world and through the stories for the collective thoughts to give hope to their future.; 4. In terms of nationalism, while spreading out the revolution ideas and providing public education, the publication also opened a gateway to the public discussion in Guangzhou using illustrations with titles like buying made-in-china products, promoting local business, women education, and drugs advertises. Hence, it played an important role in the modernization and cultural enlightenment in Guangzhou and to certain extent had effect on Shin-Hai Revolution. This essay mainly focuses on the presentations, interactions, and expressions between the storytelling and the images when they were arranged in the actual print. Through the issues mentioned in News Illustrated, this essay would also like to discuss how the idea of “wholesome nation” started to take its shape and present itself. This essay will show readers that News Illustrated centered on the ideas of “creating a wholesome and strong nation” and “promoting spirits of revolution” through its discussion on the above mentioned issues, on which the editors also created their ideal images of a nation. The topics on making art accessible to general public and showing the localization in areas surrounding Guangzhou not only makes resonation with the focuses on Guangzhou as the center from which the political revolution rose, but also shows it as the frontier of this revolution in terms of arts and cultures, and at last on the crest of criticism frenzy during that period Guangzhou created itself a criticism ground that was different from its shanghai counterpart.