In the center of Beijing, one of the world's most prominent museums has just held a global forum on how to best preserve humanity's cultural heritage. The Palace Museum also decided to open up brand new exhibition venues for its immense trove of treasures in the process.
The Palace Museum concluded its third annual Supreme Harmony Forum on Tuesday. The name of the forum is taken from the Hall of Supreme Harmony, or Taihedian. The event drew participants from ten countries, each with time-honored histories of their own, to learn important techniques for heritage preservation.
Experts from Egypt, Greece, Italy, India, and Syria explored sustainable approaches to protecting the world's ancient capitals.
The Palace Museum concluded its third annual Supreme Harmony Forum on September 18, 2018. /People's Daily Photo
"This year, our forum is putting its focus on the protection and preservation of ancient capitals," said Shan Jixiang, the curator of the Palace Museum.
"Across the world, many old cities are threatened by encroaching urbanization. Also, we have to deal with various natural disasters. Not to mention widespread misunderstandings around how to best preserve our cultural heritage. All these issues have to be addressed," Shan added.
This is the third year that the Palace Museum has hosted the forum. The event inaugurated in 2016 aims to facilitate dialogue between the inheritors of different civilizations. As well as raising awareness around the risks that the ravages of war pose to heritage sites, the forum also draws attention to the need to prevent more common threats.
Shan said the recent fire in Brazil taught people a grave lesson about cultural heritage preservation the world over. During the discussions, many participants discussed how to better raise public awareness in general.
Upon the conclusion of the forum, the Palace Museum announced the opening of three new exhibition halls in its Nandaku section.
Previously closed to the public, the sector houses a collection of furniture masterpieces from the Ming and Qing dynasties. Most of them come from the 18th-century during the reign of Emperor Qianlong. Three regal chairs, of which one is built from deer antlers, have proven to be some of the biggest highlights.
The museum announced it is planning to convert even more of its storage facilities into exhibition spaces. Over the coming two years, it hopes to display up to eight percent of its nearly two million artifacts to the public.