Yanguangshi, was the first Chinese publishing house to publish Photobooks of famous ancient painting and calligraphy from the imperial collections using the colophon photographic printing technique.
| Company type | Private |
|---|---|
| Industry | Photo-book Publisher |
| Founded | 1912 |
| Headquarters | Beijing, China |
Key people | Tong Jixu, Tong Zhishu |
| Products | Photo-books of Ancient Art Works |
History
editAfter the 1912 Xinhai Revolution, Tong Jixu started Yanguangshi to publish photo-books of ancient painting and calligraphy from the Qing imperial collections. Through his friend Chen Baochen, who was Puyi’s teacher and some of his students such as Puru, he would borrow the art pieces and use high-resolution camera to take glass version photographs of them and use advanced photographic printing process called Corot Press to print photo-books. In 1924, after Tong became an official (director of operation or Danglangzhong in Chinese) at the Imperial Household Department himself, he stopped borrowing any additional artworks from the court in order to avoid conflict of interest. He also passed the operation of the business to his eldest son, Tong Zhishu. Since then, the business only focused on re-publishing existing editions or photo-books/art catalogs of private collections. In the 1940s, Tong Zhishu sold most of the original prints to Commercial Press (Shangwu Yinshuguan in Chinese) and kept a small amount of glass prints as souvenirs.
Works
editThe photo-books include works from Wang Xizhi, Yan Zhenqing, Sun Guoting, Huaisu, Su Dongpo, Mi Fu, Guo Xi, Zhao Mengfu, and Giuseppe Castiglione, etc.
References
edit- The autobiography of Puyi– ghost-written by Li Wenda. The title of the Chinese book is usually rendered in English as From Emperor to Citizen. The book was re-released in China in 2007 in a new corrected and revised version. Many sentences which had been deleted from the 1964 version prior to its publication were now included.
- Aisin-Gioro, Puyi (1964). 我的前半生 [The First Half of My Life; From Emperor to Citizen: The Autobiography of Aisin-Gioro Puyi] (in Chinese). Foreign Languages Press. ISBN 978-7-119-00772-4. – original
- Pu Yi, Henry (2010) [1967]. The Last Manchu: The Autobiography of Henry Pu Yi, Last Emperor of China. Skyhorse Publishing. ISBN 978-1-60239-732-3. – translation
- Aixinjueluo, Puyi (爱新觉罗·溥仪) (2007) [1964]. The first half of my life （我的前半生）. Beijing: 群众出版社. ISBN 978-7-5014-3557-9.
- Zheng, Xiaoxu. Diary of Zheng Xiaoxu, Volume 4. 中国国家图书馆编: 中华书局.
- Johnston, Reginald Fleming (2009) [1918]. Letters to a Missionary. Cornell University Library. ISBN 978-1-112-04861-6.
- Johnston, Reginald Fleming (2008) [1934]. Twilight in The Forbidden City. Soul Care Publishing. ISBN 978-0-9680459-5-4.