How Do Murals Organize Viewing? Spatial Integration and Ritual Experience Mechanisms in the Sanqing Hall of Yongle Palace

Abstract

Existing studies on the murals of Yongle Palace have generally treated them as two-dimensional images for formal analysis, while neglecting the symbiotic relationship between mural painting and architectural space. Taking Chaoyuan Tu in the Sanqing Hall of Yongle Palace as the central case, this paper analyzes how murals transform architectural space into religious space from three perspectives: spatial semiotics, directional coding, and viewing paths. The study finds that the architectural space, pictorial space, and material space of the Sanqing Hall together constitute a spatial semiotic system, transforming the hall from a physical site into a sacred field. The directional distribution of the eight principal deities forms a structural correspondence with the Five Elements directional system, so that spatial arrangement itself becomes a form of religious cosmological coding. The viewer’s transition upon entering the hall, ritualized movement, and perceptual rhythm between distant and close viewing together reveal how mural space is activated through bodily movement. These three levels all point to one central proposition: the murals of Yongle Palace are not flat images attached to walls, but an integrated “spatial device” composed of the hall, directional order, and viewing path.