The Renaissance of An Urban Village
2 min readWrapped within the artsy fagade and musical pulse of present-day Beishan is a man’s reverence for tradition and passion for architectural heritage. In a sense, the village’s musical pride is far overshadowed by its key significance in China’s”village revitalization”movement.
The “revolution” of Beishan all started in the artistic gaze of Xue Yihan, the artist father of Simone Xue and his brother Xue Jun. The two masterminded not only the striking neighborhood but also the unique musical milieu of Beishan. Before a fatal heart attack in 2008, the woodblock print artist spent an abundance of time admiring the hundred-year-old architecture and talking the villagers into a salvage project that was to start with the restoration of ancestral temples. The relay baton was subsequently taken by his two sons, both crazy about art and staunchly refusing to kowtow to the march of reckless gentrification.
In 2008, restoration of a set of four of the village’s signature buildings started. The result was an art studio and art gallery set in the original structure of ancient temple buildings, and a new Beishan Theater converted from a dilapidated village theater first built in the Republican times of China.
For the first couple years, Simone was not sure exactly what to do with the theater but inspiration struck one day when he was chatting with his music-loving French-friend Jean-Jacques Verdun. Over a few cups of coffee, the blueprint of what has evolved into the best music festival brand in southern China was drawn, although the devoted son could never have predicted that he would see the village grow with such a potent glory-far more than enough to reward all the struggles his father endured.
The winding lanes are still the same ones the forefathers of today’s villagers, living in their brick-wood houses, walked for hundreds of years.
Jazz and the melodic strains of piano made the urban village once again a focal point of the community and bewitching place where East meets West. However, the winding lanes are still the same ones the forefathers of today’s villagers, living in their brick-wood houses, walked for hundreds of years. Throughout the restoration, the village’s original social fabric, together with cultural essentials and the local lifestyle, has been perfectly retained. The rebirth of Beishan has produced something that those many overdone “ancient villages” gone Disney cannot even approximate. The Xue brothers are driven by a painful awareness of how fragile yet crucial this local “sense of place” can be. It is just such a mentality and broad vision that makes Beishan much more than a simple collection of trendy international entertainmer and, rather a series of unique experiences involving the precious chemistry between tradition and creative experimentation.
