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The Chinese are increasingly exploring cultural relics as a part of their daily lives, Wang Kaihao reports in Chengdu.
No matter which city Ai Xiaoyang visits, museums always top her list of must-see places to know more about the local history and culture.
With Chinese museums showing their creativity in recent years, this veteran museum visitor from Beijing has had a good time.
"Museums are no longer isolated," says the 28-year-old.
"Their abundant souvenirs, interactive facilities and lectures make it easier to learn about the exhibits."
She has downloaded a few phone apps of the Palace Museum in Beijing to get her daily dose of the museum's collections and know about upcoming exhibitions. She has also bought many souvenirs from online stores as gifts for friends.
In mid-September in Chengdu, capital of Southwest China's Sichuan province, 6,000 souvenirs offered by the Palace Museum were sold out within a day at the 7th Chinese Museums and Relevant Products and Technologies Expo.
More Chinese are seeing museums as a part of their daily lives.
"China is the country with the fastest growth in museums," Duan Yong, director of the museum department of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, said during the expo.
"The country is marching to become a strong power in terms of museums, but there's still much to be done."
According to Duan, there were 4,692 registered museums on the Chinese mainland by the end of 2015, with the industry employing some 90,000 people. About 20,000 exhibitions were staged in the country's museums last year, attracting 700 million visitors. About 85 percent of the museums are open to the public for free.
"Most museums have realized that they are seen as institutions of academic research and education and not just exhibition venues," says Duan. "But the development of museums is not balanced in China."
According to him, there are some 1,000 counties, mostly in western China, that still have no museums.
"In spite of the fast growth, our focus needs to be switched to more specialized and grassroots museums," he says.
"And the sharing of resources among different museums will become a trend. It will be the way to enhance communication and make full use of collections."
For example, Henan Museum in Zhengzhou, capital of Central China's Henan province, has been promoting public education about museums in poverty-stricken regions not only in the province but also in western China.
"Museums are now more than custodians of cultural relics," Tian Kai, director of Henan Museum, explains.
"They have to cooperate with different cultural institutions to allow more people to enjoy their resources."
E Jun, director of Gansu Museum in Northwest China, says: "Due to dated systems, it was difficult to form regional museum alliances before."
However, things have changed in recent years.
From 2014 to 2015, Silk Road, a major exhibition reflecting the history of the ancient trade route, was displayed at Beijing's National Museum of China, which gathered key collections from 44 museums across the country.
Another show, Sailing Far and Wide on the Sea on Maritime Silk Road, brought collections from 51 museums to the Capital Museum in 2014.
"These exhibitions created new models for cooperation among Chinese museums in terms of personnel, information and academic research," says E.
Today's cooperation has gone beyond borders. Duan says there were about 100 exhibitions held jointly by China and different countries in 2015, which also partially explains why museum visitor Ai feels "many exhibitions from all over the world" are available in China. Consequently, Chinese museums also provide experiences for foreign cultural institutions.
"New museums are being built by the day (in China)," Suay Aksoy, president of the International Council of Museums, who attended the expo at Chengdu, tells China Daily.
"Museums are working with good architects. It's remarkable to see so many Chinese museums cooperate for one exhibition, which is difficult in other countries.
"And it's a good thing that Chinese museums are developing apps and online exhibitions because it will attract and educate more people.
"Only when you see and handle the objects, can you really know about the past," he says of the physical importance of relics.
Nevertheless, some professionals fear that an overheating of the sector will lead to problems.
"Sometimes a big museum is built even before the outline of an exhibition is drafted, which will obviously lead to empty halls," says Wu Xi, a veteran exhibition designer for a studio affiliated to Tsinghua University in Beijing.
"There is still much to learn from Western museums in creating an attractive atmosphere for visitors.
"We'd better think twice about what is needed by visitors and what we can give before opening a museum."
Ai considers it equally important to improve visitors' behaviors to add to an exhibition's success.
"It's often seen that some people use camera flashes and selfie sticks in exhibitions, which greatly affects the viewing experiences of others."
Contact the writer at wangkaihao@chinadaily.com.cn
