What is eclecticism?

Eclecticism is a philosophical term. Translation into Greek is easy to choose and has the ability to choose. Later, people used this word to express that they pieced together different viewpoints and various design elements, did not have their own unique opinions and fixed positions, but just pieced together different thoughts without principles and machinery. This is a way of thinking and a manifestation of metaphysical thinking. Its characteristics and manifestations are: equating the two sides of the contradiction, regardless of primary and secondary; Reconcile the opposing sides and confuse right and wrong; It is ambiguous in principle to piece together many attributes of a thing as a completely mechanical piece together.

1 the position of eclecticism in modern architectural design

1. 1 eclectic architecture

Eclectic architecture mainly refers to an architectural style that was popular in Europe and America from the first half of the 9th century to the beginning of the 20th century. With the continuous development of science and technology, the emergence of photography technology, the development of printing and publishing, and the progress of archaeology, people have learned more about architecture in various periods, countries and regions. Designers integrated the architectural styles of various countries and made full use of them in architectural design, with the architectural styles of Rome, Greece and Renaissance, so eclectic architecture appeared. The characteristics of these buildings are mainly manifested in the direct imitation or free combination of various buildings in various historical stages, focusing on pure formal beauty.

Eclecticism in China's architectural history spread with the beginning of the Opium War. After the Opium War, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Wuhan and other cities were successively opened as trading ports, Britain, France, Japan, Germany, Russia, the United States, Belgium and other countries were successively stationed, and western-style churches, hospitals, customs and schools were successively established. Therefore, eclectic architecture is passively accepted with the opening of the country. From the beginning of the 20th century to the 1930s, China's architecture blended with a lot of architectural elements, especially China's native architectural elements appeared one after another, which was regarded as "eclecticism" in the architectural history of China. From 19, in the middle and late 1920s, a large number of new buildings appeared on the land of China. For example, 1926, Shanghai Sassoon Tower adopts new technology and its new structure is very eclectic. 1937, the first climax of modern architecture in China in the 20th century was formed on the eve of the July 7th Incident. More than 20 years at the beginning of the 20th century is the initial stage of modern architectural technology, so the period from the mid-1920s in 19 to the late 1930s in 19 is the peak of modern architectural practice in China.

1.2 The emergence of architectural eclecticism in China.

When it comes to eclecticism, people are often used to understanding it as the golden mean with China, and people often confuse the two. In fact, these two concepts are not directly related. Compromise is not derogatory. Eclecticism in western history, as an architectural phenomenon, is the result of the lag in the establishment of post-modern architectural technology system and the reform of architectural ideology in the western industrial revolution. It is also the product of early capitalist globalization. The styles of isolated countries, nationalities and places have been "discovered" one after another, giving designers more style choices and more design materials. Eclecticism broke the original closed state, broke the original French style, freely played in design, arbitrarily imitated the architectural style in history, or freely combined various historical fragments to varying degrees for comprehensive transformation. The origin and prosperity of eclecticism coincides with the period of brewing and exploration of modern architecture, and its appearance is the transitional product of the transition period when the old architectural system began to collapse and evolved from the traditional architectural system to the modern architectural system. Eclecticism represents a gradual and moderate evolution.

Eclecticism is an important starting point for China architects to create traditional architecture. They tried to use western material civilization to carry forward China's inherent literary spirit. 65438+In the mid-1920s and 1930s, the palace architecture appeared in the climax of China's inherent architecture, which is a typical eclectic architecture in China. The overall feature of this building is that it takes the big roof as the prototype and expresses the national form of China on the basis of new technology and new functions. The "hybrid" architecture with flat roof and partial large roof after the "palace-style" architecture also belongs to eclectic architecture. The modern architecture with China characteristics is a "modern China architecture" which abandons the "China's inherent form" and the big roof in the later period, and is basically composed of modern architecture and traditional decoration in China. From "palace style" and "mixed style" to "modern China architecture", we can see that the development process of eclectic architecture in China is a track of gradual evolution to modern architecture.

2 Look at the development of modern architecture in China from the perspective of style research.

2. 1 imitation and reproduction1western architecture in the late 9th century and early 20th century.

With the introduction of western architectural ideas, China's architecture initially imitated and copied western architecture. The architectural representatives in this period mainly take the western-style buildings in the coastal cities of China as examples, among which the buildings such as Shanghai Bund, Nanjing Road and Gulangyu Island in Xiamen are their representatives. Established in 192 1 ~ 1923, Shanghai and Hongkong Bank adopts steel structure to imitate European masonry structure, showing its luxurious momentum with a classical image.

2.2 the 1920s-traditional architecture

The architecture of this era is the modern architecture of China, which is characterized by imitating or transforming the classical architecture of China. At the same time, it also reflects that the architectural history of China has been influenced by the world's modern architectural thoughts, and it also reflects the national consciousness inspired by China architects in the face of the invasion of foreign powers. These two factors have a fierce collision, intersection and integration, and the idea of compromise is more obvious in the formal language of architecture.

2.3 New buildings in 1930s

The so-called new architecture refers to the modern architecture in China under the impact of the "international" new architectural trend in Europe and America. Modern architecture in China refers to the period from the Opium War in 1840 to the founding of People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. During this period, China architecture was in a transitional period of connecting the preceding with the following, the intersection of China and the West, and the alternation of the old and the new.

Illustrate the influence of eclecticism on China architecture with examples.

Shanghai's historic buildings are a great collection of eclectic buildings. Shanghai Jinling East Road No.8 Residential Building 19 12 completed. The whole building is made of wood structure, and the plane form of the building is trapezoidal, which has obvious compromise style. The middle entrance of the south facade of the residential building is beautifully decorated. The second floor is a continuous sharp window hole, and the wall of the coupon is inclined inward. There are trefoil flowers on the window, and the stigma decoration between the windows is complicated. The eaves of the three-story window are simply decorated, and the window lintels are stepped. The east facade is a blue brick wall with red bricks. The entrance door is made of wood with distinctive features, and the whole facade is richly decorated.

As we all know, Harbin is known as the Little Paris of the East, and the protected buildings are mostly eclectic buildings. The proportion of eclectic works in Harbin architecture is relatively large. Even in Art Nouveau architecture, it is not difficult to find eclectic elements. The representative buildings are Railway Culture Palace (formerly Middle East Railway Club), Vehicle Factory Culture Palace, Asian Cinema and News Cinema.

4 conclusion

The development of eclectic architecture in China, from the national point of view, is the witness of foreign powers invading China. However, it also has its positive aspects. On the basis of collecting and refining various architectural styles and techniques, it has created many new architectural languages. Today, most of these historic buildings are the spaces where we live and work. These exquisite buildings always show people a beautiful formal language and reveal the historical charm of the perfect combination of Chinese and western cultures. No matter in structure, material and appearance, it can reflect the unique language form and value orientation of modern architecture in China. Modern architecture in China not only pursues nationality, but also advocates westernization and scientificity. It is not difficult to see this eclectic language form of combining Chinese and western languages from modern eclectic architecture.