Yin Yu Tang: The Architecture and Daily Life of a Chinese House

by Nancy Berliner

Overview

This book is recommended…for the Chinese history and culture sections of both public and academic libraries.--Library Journal

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781462909414
Publisher:	Tuttle Publishing
Publication date:	10/30/2012
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
File size:	14 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Nancy Berliner is currently the Wu Tung Curator of Chinese Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. She previously held the position of curator of Chinese art at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, where she spearheaded and curated the Yin Yu Tang house project. She also serves as a consultant to the World Monuments Fund on the Forbidden City's Qianlong Garden conservation project. She has lectured throughout the world including at Harvard University, Dartmouth College, University of California at Berkeley, Asia Society, La Sorbonne in Paris, Tel Aviv University, Palace Museum and World Art Museum in Beijing. She has written for the New York Times, Asian Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, Asian Art, and Orientations magazines.

Table of Contents

1. The history, culture and geography of the Huizhou region—portrait of a prosperous merchant culture
2. The architecture of the Chinese house—feng shui, construction methods, craftspeople, etc.
3. The Huang family—seven generations of Chinese family life at Yin Yu Tang
4. Ornament and objects—the cultural messages of decorations, furniture, family heirlooms, etc.
5. Yin Yu Tang in America—the restoration and reconstruction at the Peabody Essex Museum

Editorial Reviews

… it is the profoundly moving saga of the Huang family, generations of whom lived and died in Yin Yu Tang, that raises this above a routine preservation success story. The many woes that have racked China and its resilient people over centuries cannot but arouse our empathy for the valiant Huangs, whose ancestral residence became a palimpsest of those wider tribulations. Their touching and uplifting stories, told in the first person through letters, diaries and interviews, confirm how the psychic relationship between house and home is by far the most elemental function of architecture. — Martin Filler

The New York Times

"The complex tale of Yin Yu Tang's salvation, careful dismantling, painstaking reconstruction and authentic refurnishing at the New England institution is alluded to in a brief epilogue. But it is the profoundly moving saga of the Huang family, generations of whom lived and died in Yin Yu Tang, that raises this above a routine preservation success story. Their touching and uplifting stories, told in the first person through letters, diaries and interviews, confirm how the psychic relationship between house and home is by far the most elemental function of architecture." —The New York Times

"If only walls could talk? Well, Yin Yu Tang's did, and what a story they have to tell." —Asian Review of Books

"This book is recommended…for the Chinese history and culture sections of both public and academic libraries." —Library Journal

"When architecture is viewed as an art, it marks the beginning of civilization Echoed with traditional music, it is a history book written in wood and stone." —Luo Zhewen, architectural historian and author of Ancient Pagodas in China and China's Imperial Tombs and Mausoleums

"Oh, if a house could talk…" Thanks to the Peabody Essex Museum and this book, Yin Yu Tang is speaking volumes about its fascinating two-hundred-year history. As a correspondent for CBS News Sunday Morning, I've gotten to do some amazing stories, but it isn't often one completely captivates me the way this one did. The story of Yin Yu Tang, the house that left home, is magical." —Martha Teichner, CBS News

From the Publisher