The Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts and The Palace Museum jointly unveil for you the secret of royal art of East and West. Experts from the School of Traditional Arts and Palace Museum will take you to explore the language of Eastern and Western traditional arts, learn how the order of nature inspires the world cultural heritage and understand the timeless arts and architecture of the Forbidden City and the classical gardens of Suzhou.
Decoding Royal Traditional Arts: Youth Summer Camp is a summer course to learn about royal arts designed specifically for teenagers. For two weeks, guided by tutors from The School of Traditional Arts and experts from the Palace Museum, participants will learn about the traditional arts in China and other civilizations around the world and their interrelations.
How did our ancestors design?
「All great art traditions share an awareness and understanding of the order of nature and its harmony. This understanding is absent from today's education. For years, the Prince’s School has defined the term 'the order of nature', which has been the most important point of reference in the work we do: it informs our ethos, it is reflected in the development of our unique teaching methodology and it offers a means to understand each culture’s worldview.
Through this principle, we support the education and practices of traditional arts and crafts throughout the world and try to pass on our vision to the younger generation, encouraging them to create from the process of learning within a tradition. After nine years of visits and investigation, we finally launched our centre in the historical city of Suzhou. We are very happy to share our research to young people in China.」
PFSTA Director Dr. Khaled Azzam
The teaching will be delivered in classrooms located within the cultural heritage sites in Beijing and Suzhou. Through historically informed learning and hands-on practices, students can better understand and learn from the royal art traditions of East and West. Participants will be guided by tutors to learn how to approach the design process and to produce series of works to reveal the links between art, culture nature and design. They will understand how patterns, symbols and motifs have been shared and adapted by different cultures, because they are drawn from our common human experience of the order of nature and its harmonious proportions.
Through a variety of hands-on creative activities - observation, analysis and drawings of nature and architecture - they will understand how these designs have been created, shared and adapted by our ancestors.
Participants will be guided through the gardens of Suzhou and the Forbidden City to get a fuller understanding of this cultural heritage.Participants will then be guided to design and create their own artworks. The workshop will conclude with an exhibition of the participants' work at the Palace Museum.
Taught by experts from East and West, this workshop will enable personal growth in humanitarian subjects and cultivate appreciation of traditional artsthrough integrated learning methodology of comparison, cognition and reflection,culminating in an experience that is both outwardly and inwardly transformative.
「Through my school for the traditional arts, I have tried to do what I can to continue the living traditions of the world’s sacred and traditional art forms. It is all too easily forgotten how crucial traditions are in handing on the immense richness of human knowledge, wisdom and skill, and giving them new life and new application. I hope that The School’s practical teaching and outreach programmes will enable the next generation to bring their inheritance to life.」
HRH The Prince of Wales
HRH the Prince of Wales meets MA students at his School of Traditional Arts degrees show in London.
· Experience creative learning through the unique teaching methodology developed by the School of Traditional Arts;
· A full immersion experience within a culturally diverse international environment;
· Develop and broaden language skills within a creative setting with classes taught in both English and Chinese;
· Nurturea deeper sense of cultural identity through the study of traditional and Royalarts and design.
· Learn the invaluable process of design from research and observation to the completion of a study sheet and a complete artwork.
· Learna wide range of new creative practical skills, including drawing accuratecomplex geometric patterns by hand, and diverse painting techniques.
· Learn how to present your own work to the public during the exhibition.
· Be awarded a joint certificate of completion by the Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts and the Palace Museum.
WEEK 1 August 5th - 9th
Suzhou, PFSTA China Centre
Activities include:
- Site visits to the gardens of Suzhou Classroom exercises in analysis and drawing inspired from nature.
- Explore different tools and techniques while working at different scales, in order to create a rich set of drawings inspired by nature
- Introduction to the principles of geometric patterns
- Foundation of drawing skills
- The process of design development
WEEK 2 August 10th - 17th
Beijing, Palace Museum
Activities include:
- Site visits to the Forbidden City
- Presentations by Palace Museum experts
- Contextual studies of the art and architecture studied in the classroom analysis of the first week
- Developing and finalising study sheets and individual artworks
- Presentation and exhibition of the students research and artwork
* Language: English and Chinese with translations
* A more detailed schedule will be provided up to changes.
Key approaches to the study of patterns and architecture from PFSTA
• Visual analysis and observational drawing;
• Investigations of proportions and symmetries as basic design tools;
• Learn how to draw geometric patterns with accuracy and correct proportion with a compass and straight edge;
• Understand colour composition based on natural resources and traditional knowledge;
• Universal principles of design across traditions as inspired by the order of nature;
• Teaching practical art and crafts skills as an expression of the above design principles.
What to learn from
The Palace Museum experts
• The historical context of these elements;
• The significance of their location and function within the Palace architecture and courtyards;
• The techniques historically employed to create these elements;
• The contributions made by different craftsmen towards the restorations of these elements throughout historical periods;
• The meaning behind the choices of colours and patterns in the decorative elements of the Palace Museum;
• Key design approaches to the creation of harmonious proportions of these elements.
PFSTA Tutor：William Riding
William is a painter and designer, as well as a teacher and project manager at the Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts. In this role he has developed teaching material and delivered workshops for worldwide audiences of all ages – from primary school children to professional designers. In his teaching practice he specialises in Islamic and world traditions geometric patterns, the construction of 3-dimensional structure, traditional Western painting techniques. He also developed curriculum materials for schools in the UK and Azerbaijan as part of the widely popular PFSTA Harmony programme. William has also taught workshops for young designers in Dunhuang, China, researching and delivering material based on the traditional arts of Dunhuang and the silk route. As part of his research into traditional Chinese arts, he has also studied the decorative patterns found on the architectural elements of the Palace Museum in Beijing. In his personal practice, he continues to research traditional drawing methodologies and painting practices. William gained his Master Degree at the Prince’s School of Traditional arts in London specialising in Western painting traditions and the study of geometry. Prior to studying at PSTA, William was working in the UK museums and heritage sector for the Wallace Collection, a major cultural institution in London. In this role he was responsible for the refurbishment programme and the display of its internationally renowned art collection. As part of the museum’s exhibition programme, he was also working closely with curators from major art institutions all over the world, including among others, the Louvre in Paris, the Getty in Los Angeles and the Metropolitan in New York.
The Palace Museum Chief Tutor：Wang Shiwei
Wang Shiwei（王時偉） is Senior Engineer and Researcher in the Historical Architecture Department of the Palace Museum. A graduate of the Architecture Department of Tsinghua University with a specialization in in historical architecture, Prof. Wang has been involved in the research, design and implementation of historical preservation and restoration initiatives for over forty years. He has served as Chairman and Secretary General of the China Association for Preservation Technology for Cultural Relics (CAPTCR), and is an academic advisor for the Master’s Degree Programme at the Chinese National Academy of Arts. He has played a key role in a number of major projects in the historical preservation and restoration of important cultural sites throughout China and elsewhere, including leading the Sino-US collaborative restoration project of the Juanqinzhai and the Qianlong Garden in the Forbidden City; and the Hong San See Temple in Singapore, which received the Award of Excellence in the 2010 UNESCO Asia-Pacific Heritage Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation. He is the author and editor of numerous studies in the field, including Research and Preservation of Juanqinzhai, The Qianlong Garden Preservation Plan, Fuwang Pavilion, and Artistic Wood Decoration.
The Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts China Centre
The Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts (PFSTA) is an acknowledged international institute of excellence. The School in London offers practical art education at Masters and Doctoral levels. The work of The Prince’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts clearly manifests a very important aspect of the vision of HRH, which is the concept of Harmony and the profound impact it has on every aspect of our lives. The School’s Education and Outreach programmes clearly illustrate the fundamental connection between this concept of harmony and the order of nature, and how this relationship was the principal inspiration for the visual arts of all the great civilizations of the world. PFSTA launched its China Centre in Yuan Centre, at the historical city of Suzhou in September 2018. As the only institution in China to have official, certified affiliation with PFSTA, China Centre honours the heritage of the traditional arts and crafts of China through education programmes aimed at reinvigorating tradition within the contemporary context. PFSTA China Centre wholeheartedly supports the propagation and reinvigoration of intangible culture through its independent and collaborative projects.
* PFSTA in London (left) and the classroom of PFSTA China Centre in Suzhou (right).
The Forbidden City Gallery of The Palace Museum
The Forbidden City Gallery (紫禁書院) is a subsidiary of the Beijing Palace Museum Cultural Communications Company, and is a dedicated space for cultural and artistic experience. Since it was first established in the Palace Museum’s Dongchangfang in August 2015, the Gallery has actively promoted knowledge and understanding of the culture of the Forbidden City through displays of Forbidden City publications and cultural products, educational programmes in traditional culture, onsite educational experience, art exhibitions, etc. In order to more actively foster a fuller and deeper understanding among the general public of the rich cultural heritage of the Forbidden City, the Gallery has also opened branches in different areas of the country, offering organized programmes in traditional culture and museum education comprising lecture series, seminars, cultural events, and dynamic performances. In essence, the mission of the Forbidden City Gallery is to carry the culture of the Forbidden City beyond the walls of the Forbidden City itself. The Forbidden City Gallery initiative integrates public service and cultural industry by creating dynamic contemporary venues for the exploration of the Forbidden City culture and of the ongoing operations taking place to preserve and activate its unique heritage.
*Interior views of The Forbidden City Gallery
AGE GROUP: 12-14 years old
NUMBER OF PARTICIPANTS: 20
DATE:
August 5th – 18th, 2019
LOCATION:
Week 1: The Prince『s Foundation School of Traditional Arts China Centre in Yuan Centre, Suzhou.
Week 2: Forbidden City Gallery of Palace Museum in Beijing
INQUIRIES AND REGISTRATION:
Ms. Chen Yun
chenyun@pfstachina.com
+86 15900672541