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Carlos Rojas begins his study of visuality in China with a look at the fascinating photographs of the Empress Dowager Cixi (1835-1908), who posed herself carefully for the camera. Indeed, these 1903-5 images, captured by court photographer Xunling, vividly catch the complexities of visual representation and practice during the chaotic and nonlinear transition from traditional to modern ways of perception. Rojas's research confirms that a photo may not lie, but cracking its meaning is no trivial pursuit. Rojas deciphers the gazes of Cixi, Xunling, and Cixi's attendant Deling to outline the development of three discourses of visuality that he identifies as belonging to the late imperial period, the mid-twentieth century, and contemporary times, although they are uncannily already represented in the perspectives of these three.
The book is organized into three parts, which elaborate on three different types of visuality through an interpretive analysis of literature, art, photography, and film. Rojas assumes that the modes of visuality of any given period correspond to its sociocultural tendencies and thus contain clues that will open doors to the more enigmatic and abstract shape of the times. Part I, "Specularity," discusses work by Li Ruzhen and Chen Sen, and their use of the mirror gaze...