Chinanews.com, Beijing, April 29 (Xu Jing Du Yan) Every city has a beautiful scenery and a place that makes people nostalgic.
What do you think of when you mention Beijing?
The Forbidden City with red walls and green tiles, the busy Chang'an Avenue, or the primitive form of Beijing as a capital.
Or maybe it's the central axis that runs through the city from north to south, extending to the terminal of Daxing International Airport...
In Beijing, there is a group of young people who use painting to convey their love, and use the central axis to tell the past and present of Beijing.
Tourists visit the exhibition "Life on the Central Axis" photo by Xu Jing
Interpret the central axis with pictures
You may have heard about the history of the Central Axis, or you may not yet understand it. The Central Axis of Beijing is fully preparing to welcome its new identity-World Heritage.
In 2012, the "Beijing Central Axis" was successfully included in the "China World Heritage Tentative List".
At present, the Beijing Central Axis has identified 14 heritage sites, including Tiananmen Square, Yongdingmen Square, and Temple of Heaven. The total area of the heritage area and buffer zone covers 65.4% of the area of the old city.
The central axis, which is the carrier of architecture in memory, is also an important carrier of Beijing's urban culture.
How to show the close connection between the central axis and modern life to more people?
"We draw Beijing, and use pictures to explain the light knowledge and trivial principles behind this city." This is the introduction of "Emperor Capital Painting" to himself.
As a historical symbol, the central axis also affects people's modern life.
According to the book, the central axis is not true south and true north, but has an angle of about 2° with the meridian.
When the team drew all the streets that were parallel or perpendicular to the central axis, it was found that this deflection angle affects the buildings near the axis so far, and even the roads on the campus have the same deflection angle of 2°.
Song Zhuangzhuang, the founder of "Emperor Capital Painting", said that the most important creative purpose of the book "The Central Axis" is to connect the past and the present through the pictures, so that everyone can perceive that the central axis not only exists in history, but also penetrates the citizens. In his life, it is "living heritage"; the second is to show a more complete central axis and expand readers' understanding of it.
"Central Axis" is divided into three main chapters: city, architecture and life.
In order to emphasize the sense of orientation of this axis, the book adopts the form of flipping up and down (north and south).
The team also chose a different way of expression for each chapter: "City" is a map, "Architecture" is a model, and "Life" is an illustration.
In order to expand readers’ understanding of the central axis, in addition to the familiar Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, and Bell and Drum Towers, in the chapter "Architecture", some buildings that have disappeared have been added to fully present more aspects of the central axis. In the chapter "Life", I choose to cut into daily life fragments, such as the Beijing Children's Palace where Song Zhuangzhuang's children often went, which was once the official school of Jingshan in the Qing Dynasty.
Students of different ages study in the same place to highlight that the central axis still has practical significance in the contemporary era.
"We want to make a book that allows you to truly understand the central axis, and a book that allows you to discover the connection between yourself and the central axis." The team wrote in the promotion of "Central Axis".
In its published articles, there are not only the "central axis", but also the life guide of areas such as "Beijing XX Street" and Chaoyang District Shopping Mall "Zhizhi", as well as illustrations of landmarks such as Beijing Daxing International Airport.
"We hope that through the relatively modern presentation of infographics, China's history can be more connected with today's life, and the central axis culture can be explained more completely," said Song Zhuangzhuang.
Tourists visit the exhibition "Life on the Central Axis" photo by Xu Jing
Let more people like Beijing
When asked why they chose to create related content in Beijing, Song Zhuangzhuang and Li Mingyang, the two founders of "Emperor Capital Painting", came up with the same answer: Let more people like Beijing.
Everyone has different emotions for the city they live in.
Li Mingyang was in middle school during the preparations for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. At that time, his home was far away from the school. The time spent on the bus every day became introverted time for him and the city to "live alone".
The scenery outside the window changes day by day, and his knowledge of Beijing is gradually deepening.
"There was no mobile phone at that time, and the time on the road made me curious about this city, but now everyone can see more things, and the time to really see the city has decreased," said Li Mingyang.
Out of such "worries", they brought together a group of recorders who like to observe, explore, and spread the city, and used pictures to express the content of Beijing's urban culture.
In addition to professional reasons, the reason for choosing this way of expression of pictures is also related to the objectivity of the pictures when they are presented.
"We found that the performance of photos and texts will be more or less affected by subjective factors, and the drawing is objective, especially architectural drawing, this will be more obvious," Song Zhuangzhuang said.
Through drawing and text description, readers' ability to read pictures can be exercised while presenting more information, and a city can be displayed more completely.
When creating, the team will focus on emphasizing the practical significance of architecture today.
Song Zhuangzhuang introduced that when creating "The Great Wall Painting", because the Great Wall is often rooted in people's hearts as a flat cultural symbol in modern times, in order to highlight its presence in modern life, they drew 100 "Great Wall Cards" on one page. "Items: There are food, tableware, and many building materials.
“Because the Great Wall can stand upright, many construction materials like to be named after the Great Wall. It is very possible that the space we are in now has the building materials of the Great Wall brand,” he said.
Beijing also has some common problems in big cities.
In the past few years, the topic of "escaping from Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou" has been repeatedly mentioned, which has deepened many people's negative impression of Beijing.
"But in my opinion, these are two sides. When we enjoy the convenience brought by big cities, we must make a certain degree of compromise for them. I have always believed that more than 20 million people live here together. It shows that the attraction of Beijing must exist," Song Zhuangzhuang said.
In order to allow more people to truly understand Beijing, they try to cut in from a more niche and interesting perspective, using themes instead of traditional time and space narratives to show the unknown places in Beijing.
Let the readers gradually get along with the city and at the same time like Beijing more.
Achieve yourself in love
Li Mingyang, who majored in architecture, is now engaged in urban planning-related work. For him, painting is his entertainment.
He introduced that this hobby allowed him to be recognized by people in the field of urban planning, and then he gained his current job.
The work on both sides promotes each other, enriches life, and also accomplishes oneself.
In the creative process, team members often come into contact with new fields and new knowledge.
Member Zhang Jing believes that everyone's understanding of the city is relatively fragmented, and that such a book can radiate to different groups in a more systematic and understandable way.
"I think this way of illustration can attract people of different ages: children can learn simple knowledge through pictures, adults can find more urban clues in books, and we will also find important points of attention when we create. , And then add it to the work," she said.
In the offline public welfare exhibition hall of "Central Axis", the reporter saw that the wall of the exhibition hall is like a miniature map of the central axis from south to north. In addition to the introduction of the book content, visitors can also use paper to create their own cartoons. Image, and leave a story about yourself and the central axis on the wall.
"We hope to record the times in our own way, so that people can discover more things that are different from the past. These discoveries can also help us find more ways to explore the city," said Zhang Jing.
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