Description - Luke Him Sau, Architect - China's Missing Modern by Edward Denison
Luke Him Sau/Lu Qianshou (1904?1991) is best known
internationally and in China as the architect of the iconic Bank of
China Headquarters in Shanghai. One of the first Chinese students
to be trained at the Architectural Association in London in the
late 1920s, Luke?s long, prolific and highly successful
career in China and Hong Kong offers unique insights into an
extraordinary period of Chinese political turbulence that scuppered
the professional prospects and historical recognition of so many of
his colleagues.
Global interest in China has risen exponentially in recent
times, creating an appetite for the country?s history and
culture. This book satiates this by providing a highly engaging and
visual account of China?s 20th-century architecture through
the lens of one of the country?s most distinguished yet
overlooked designers. It features over 250 new colour photographs
by Edward Denison of Luke?s buildings and original archive
material.
The book charts Luke?s life and work, commencing with his
childhood in colonial Hong Kong and his apprenticeship with a
British architectural firm before focusing on his education at the
Architectural Association (1927?30). In London, Luke was
offered the post of Head of the Architecture Department at the
newly established Bank of China, where IM Pei?s father was a
senior figure. Luke spent the next seven years in the inimitable
city of Shanghai designing buildings all over China for the Bank
before the Japanese invasion in 1937 forced him, and countless
others, to flee to the proxy wartime capital of Chongqing. In 1945
he returned to Shanghai where he formed a partnership with four
other Chinese graduates of UK universities; but civil war (between
the Communists and Nationalists) once again caused him and others
to uproot in 1949. Initially intent on fleeing with the
Nationalists to Taiwan, Luke was almost convinced to stay in
Communist China but decided finally to move to Hong Kong. There,
for the third time in his life, he had to establish his career all
over again. Despite many challenges, he eventually prospered,
becoming a pioneer in the design of private residences, schools,
hospitals, chapels and public housing.
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Architecture and the Landscape of Modernity in China before 1949
