Chongqing urban parks as representation and performance of a spatial imaginary

Located in the southwestern part of China, Chongqing Municipality represents a relatively new political and administrative entity since it was established only in 1997, with the purpose of revitalizing this economically depressed area and providing a direct link with the central government in view of the construction of the Three Gorges Dam. Despite of its short history as municipality, the city of Chongqing is actually a place rich of memories connected not only with the war of Resistance and the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, but also with a more remote past that goes back to the ancient Ba-Shu reign. Therefore, the urban territory is covered with more or less visible traces of architectonic facts that in a particular historical moment have added some significance to the man-environment relationship, re-shaping the understanding of the urban space in virtue of its transformation. This paper presents some projects of urban parks designed in three different historical circumstances: The Republican period, the establishment of New China after 1949, and the contemporary urban planning envisioned with the purpose of enlarging the urban boundaries of a city in continuous growth. The discourses concerning these public spaces allow the unraveling of their political and cultural meaning in time, while their spatialization as territorial practice implies the performance of specific logics, strongly connected with the need to recursively construct a collective identity in relation to the local. The analysis aims to highlight the planning of these urban spaces as a structure of signification, legitimation, and performative activity in their specific contexts, also considering their contribution to the shaping of the image of the city.