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127 The influence of Beaux-Arts methods in Taiwan should be assessed by examining architectural practice and education, both of which began to change significantly after Japan colonized Taiwan, from 1895 to 1945. The first part of this chapter will examine the implications of that colonization on the island’s architecture, explaining one way in which Beaux-Arts assumptions about architectural design were transmitted to Taiwan in conjunction with Japanese notions of architectural and urban space, form, and design.1 A second, more intensive strain of Beaux-Arts influence began in 1949, when many anti-Communist architectural professionals accompanied the Nationalist government in its move from the Chinese mainland to Taiwan. The second part of this chapter will focus on the nature and results of that influence.2 Some of these professionals started their architectural practices immediately after arriving in Taiwan and applied Beaux-Arts-inspired approaches to their building designs. This phenomenon was strengthened by what is often called the “Chinese Cultural Renaissance Movement,” when hundreds of public buildings were constructed as a result of Beaux-Arts composition but with a Chinese classical appearance stylistically. Beaux-Arts-influenced designs became one of the most important trends in postwar Taiwan, especially in the 1950s and early 1960s. Another measure of this influence stemmed from architectural education, because some of the Chinese architectural professionals became teachers at one of Taiwan’s most influential training grounds for architects, the Taiwan Provincial College of Engineering, now known as Cheng Kung (Zhenggong) University,3 and these professionals instituted Beaux-Arts training approaches. The chapter will conclude by considering the implications of these Beaux-Arts approaches. Beaux-Arts in the Context of Japanese Colonization, 1895–1945 Historians have suggested that Japan’s seizure of Taiwan as a colonial dependency was in part linked to Japan’s need for greater supplies of sugar and rice; others focus on the colonization as an early example of a pan-Asian foreign policy that ultimately led in the 1930s and 1940s to warfare in China and throughout the Pacific.4 During the first decade of their colonization of Taiwan, the Japanese appropriated facilities built during the Qing dynasty, constructed new facilities, and started to transform the island’s cities. The demolition of city walls, which Fu Chao-Ching BEAUX-ARTS PRACTICE AND EDUCATION BY CHINESE ARCHITECTS IN TAIWAN 6 128 Fu Chao-Ching were both symbolic and defensive in function, followed soon thereafter. This action implied the collapse of the old regime and the rearrangement into a new political map. By means of what was termed “City Improvement,” a mixture of gridiron and radiating systems was applied to urban patterns that Japan had adapted from the West. The reason was obvious: when Japan emerged as a major world power after the Meiji Restoration (1868–1912), Western models in architecture and urban planning had become Japan’s ideal models. City Improvement was the method that the Japanese adopted in the early stage of Taiwan’s urban transformation. The term “improvement” revealed the value judgment of Japanese colonialists with regard to traditional settlements and modern cities. When this judgment was applied to urban transformation, the preference was always for the ideal model of the colonial government, rather than the indigenous settlements of the colony. The characteristics of traditional Taiwanese cities were thoroughly altered after fifty years of occupation by the Japanese. The emphasis on the urban façade by means of Western stylistic decoration, and the creation of urban nodes such as crossroads and traffic circles were most apparent. Both of these enhanced the architecture of the city. However, the essence of city improvement and planning was the scientific approach used to improve the urban built environment. The policy was strongly supported by the fourth governor-general, Kodama Gentaro, and his civil administrator, Goto Shimpei, who initiated many building projects to improve living standards in Taiwan. Moreover, urban nodes were created, where governmental buildings and train stations were located. The characteristics of monumentality and the symmetrical spatial organization of the buildings located at the traffic circles, crossroads, and ends of vistas were closely associated with the formal and spatial elements of Beaux-Arts design. The influx into Taiwan of architects possessing Western architectural knowledge was accompanied by the rapid growth of a stylistically hybrid architecture that reached its zenith in the 1910s, by which time the Japanese were creating a new central business district in the western gate area of Taipei (Ximending) and reinforcing commercial...

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