Sections in the Exhibition
Beginnings traces Shanghai from its modest start to its rise to prominence after its designation as a “Treaty Port” by Britain and China in the 1842 Treaty of Nanjing. Trade oil paintings, Shanghai school paintings, and a series of lithographs present the city as the international economic hub that it had become in a relatively short time.
High Times represents the golden era of Shanghai, when the city was at its historic commercial and cultural height. Ink and oil paintings, posters, qipao (dresses of a style created in the 1920s in Shanghai and made fashionable by socialites and upper-class women), film clips, and Shanghai deco furniture together capture the launching of a public romance with the city that continues today.
Revolution highlights a collection of propaganda posters that document the changing landscape of Shanghai as it embraced the call for industrialization during China’s new race toward modernization. Other artworks in this section include woodblock prints and ink and oil paintings.
Shanghai Today presents the visual culture that is emerging as the city reclaims its role as a leading center of global trade and finance. Photographs, prints, paintings, and installation art illustrate the face of this contemporary cosmopolis.
