Fifteenth International Conference on The Inclusive Museum

Abstract

At a critical juncture in its economic reform, China has ushered in a new era of cultural transition while Chinese art museums embrace a nascent curatorial mechanism for knowledge (re)production. This paper examines the case study of Zhejiang Art Museum (Hangzhou) in a Chinese key national art museum context, which demonstrates the interplay of poetics and politics in its exhibiting display, adopting a methodological approach based on fieldwork, semi-structured interviews with museum curators and directors, and participant observation. In this paper, I argue that the museum rationalises the “modernity” of Chinese national art by employing a pedagogical aesthetic approach in a neonationalist narrative, while promoting contemporary Chinese art by employing a story-telling approach based on Chinese myths and legends narrative texts, illustrating two trajectories of the museum’s art production. This research contributes significantly to the field of Chinese public art museum studies. It paints a complex picture of how collection and exhibition policies, as well as the initiative of local art ecosystem, influence the museum’s cultural production and knowledge rhetoric in contemporary China.