During
my trip to China this year, I visited Jing’an Temple located in downtown
Shanghai. It is old and it had a complicated history, but today it stands tall
and proud (see images above). For a person interested in Oriental art and
culture Jing’an offers many interesting bits and pieces to explore. Being a
bonsai enthusiast myself, I couldn’t help noticing a couple of feature trees growing
in one of the courtyards. They looked well looked after and thoughtfully
styled. Below are photos of the nicer one of the two.
The
main hall or ‘The Precious Hall of the Great Hero’ is a beautifully decorated
timber structure, which had one curious feature. All outer pillars of it were
as shown in the image below right, however one corner pillar was different as
you can see in the image below left. We are told that Chinese aesthetics favour
symmetry, however in this instance the architect decidedly left a snag with a
huge gall as an odd feature.
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