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March 27, 2016

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Home » Feature » Art and Culture

Seventy years on, exhibition reunites the Soong sisters

By Xu Qin | March 27, 2016, Sunday | Print Edition

AN exhibition titled “The Soong Sisters: Special Memories” will be held at Duoyunxuan Art Center in Shanghai between April 28 and July 31.

Born to a missionary family, the three Soong sisters were among China’s most significant political figures of the early 20th century. Each played a major role in influencing her husband, which, along with their own positions of power, ultimately changed the course of Chinese history.

About 300 selected items of the Soong sisters collected from both China’s mainland and Taiwan will be on display at the exhibition. Alongside the old photos, documentaries and historical video clips showing the Soong sisters in public appearance, there are many personal belongings showing the rare and intimate moments of the sisters throughout their lives.

Visitors get to see Ai-ling’s High Algebra textbook used in her college days at the Wesleyan University; Ching-ling’s cigarette holder and many of her mandarin dresses; and May-ling’s personal letter to Chiang Kai-shek after the Xi’an Incident as well as her paintings. Many of the exhibits are first shown to the public on China’s mainland.

The eldest of the Soong sisters, Ai-ling, was the wife of Kung Hsiang-Hsi, who was the richest man in the early 20th century in China. Ching-ling, the second, was married to Sun Yat-sen, the father of modern China and first president of the Republic of China. And May-ling, the youngest, was a prominent political leader in her own right and married to Chiang Kai-shek, chairman of the National Military Council and later leader of the Republic of China between 1928 and 1975.

Throughout their lifetime, each sisters followed her own belief in terms of supporting the Kuomintang (KMT) or the Communist Party of China (CPC). In 1937, when the Second Sino-Japanese war broke out, all three of them got together in an effort to unite the KMT and CPC against the Japanese invasion.

In 1940, they established the Chinese Industrial Cooperatives in Chongqing, which opened job opportunities for people through weaving, sewing and other crafts. The sisters frequently visited schools, hospitals, orphanages, air raid shelters and aided war-torn communities along the way.

As both parties failed to unite after World War II, the sisters became estranged. In 1944, Ai-ling emigrated to America; May-ling went with the nationalists to Taiwan in 1950; only Ching-ling stayed back in China’s mainland and sided with the CPC.

The last time the three sisters saw each other was in 1949, but, some 70 years later, “The Soong Sisters: Special Memories” aims to “re-unite” them in Shanghai.

Tickets for the exhibition have started selling at East Ticket. For more information, please check http://www.ticket2010.com/program17123.html

 

Date: From April 28 to July 31, 10am-5pm

Admission: Workday 80 yuan per person, weekends 100 yuan per person

Venue: Duoyunxuan Art Center

Address: 1188 Tianyaoqiao Rd

Art and Culture


 

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