Ninghai News
On one end of the Maya Street, which is 386 meters long, stands the north hall of Tianyi Pavilion, which has been there for 458 years; while on the end of the street, the renovation work of the historical and cultural block of the south hall of Tianyi Pavilion is being carried out in an orderly manner.
Standing next to the former residence of Weng Wenhao, a provincial-level cultural heritage site, Xu Shenghua, a senior engineer at Ningbo Urban Construction Investment Group, carefully pointed to the construction site of the Dashuyuan Lane, which is three meters away.
“In the future, this area will be integrated into the cultural district project of the south hall of Tianyi Pavilion in the form of a block, offering commercial and cultural supporting services. Then tourists and citizens can come here for a stroll, a visit or just for leisure consumption.” said Xu Shenghua. As a modern exhibition and exchange experience area, the south hall of Tianyi Pavilion will highlight its “public” feature and “utility” in the contemporary context.
On July 3, the comprehensive promotion of the construction of the South Hall of the Tianyi Pavilion was held at the Top Scholar Hall of the museum. At the ceremony, Liu Yuejin, a member of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and deputy director of the Department of Culture, History, and Philosophy, said: “Ningbo is a pioneer explorer of Chinese maritime civilization, a key city for the inheritance and development of excellent traditional Chinese culture, and a frontier and exemplary city for cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries. The development of Mingzhou (former name of Ningbo) Port since the Tang and Song dynasties reflects its cultural inclusiveness and international perspective. We believe that with great efforts, Ningbo will definitely demonstrate its new look and responsibility as a sample city with tangible results, and become a model and leading city for the creative transformation and innovative development of excellent traditional Chinese culture.”
Cultural development is the prerequisite for spiritual prosperity. Currently, Ningbo is implementing the thoughts of culture of Xi Jinping, shouldering the new cultural missions of the new era, and adhering to the deep integration of “port, production, urban development and culture”, to comprehensively promote the decoding of cultural genes, the inheritance and protection of culture, and the building of cultural symbols. While consolidating economic “hard power”, the city is constantly accumulating its corresponding cultural “soft power”.
The construction of major cultural landmarks has been in full swing from scratch. In July, Ningbo Children’s Library, the first project of the top ten cultural landmarks in Ningbo, was officially put into use and received 128,000 readers in its first month of opening. According to a staff member of the library, the service desk, desks and chairs, and bookshelves of the library are all customized, reducing their height while enhancing the comfort level of the experience. “The children-friendliness reflected in details is an important symbol of high-quality urban development.”
Meanwhile, according to a person in charge from Ningbo Municipal Bureau of Culture, Radio, Film, Television and Tourism, other cultural landmark projects are also progressing in an orderly manner. The construction of the South Hall of the Tianyi Pavilion is well under way. The main building of Wang Yangming Memorial Hall has been completed. The new Hemudu Site Museum, the new hall of Ningbo Cultural Museum, and the Intangible Cultural Heritage have started prepartion for construction. The projects of Ningbo River Museum, the new hall of Ningbo Museum, and the new Concert Hall are currently undergoing site selection and evaluation. The implementation plan for Ningbo Performing Arts Center has been finalized.
The springing up of so many cultural landmarks serves as great evidence and strong support for Ningbo’s position as a “prominent historic and cultural city”.
A wealth of small public cultural facilities are within reach, like the Moonlake Art Museum, the Art and Life Park of the Old Bund , and the Huigang Art Gallery. In Ningbo, a group of “small and beautiful” public cultural spaces are scattered like pearls in urban commercial districts, cultural and tourism attractions, and community corners. Citizens can have access to those facilities within fifteen minutes, leading to a sense of happiness for their cultural life.
In Gejia Village, Dajiahe Town of Ninghai County, Ge Wanyong, who has been a bricklayer for over 30 years, is glowing with a sense of pride when seeing the works he participated in designing and producing displayed in the exhibition hall. The art exhibition held in the village not only ingeniously integrates the local flavor with modern aesthetics, but also allows villagers to see the improvement of the village’s taste on the basis of clean and beautiful rural environment.
In 2016, Ningbo took the lead in the country in proposing and implementing the “One Art for One Person” art popularization project, and accelerating the building of the “15-minute quality cultural life circles” by fully mobilizing social forces to participate widely in the art popularization project. As of now, 1,315 “15-minute quality cultural life circles” have been built throughout urban and rural areas, serving as the “nerve endings” of the cultural “veins”.
To enhance people’s cultural lives, the improvement of public cultural services requires spatial support and colorful activities.
In April of this year, the 2024 Ningbo National Reading Event, with the theme of “Reading Classics together with Children”, was officially launched. The 3,500 characteristic reading activities throughout the year will “l(fā)ight up” hundreds of reading corners throughout the city for accompanying children to read classics. Led by the “Reading in Ningbo” brand, Ningbo is witnessing an increasingly strong reading atmosphere citywide, which has in turn promoted the development of various reading spaces and corners. A variety of reading activities have been arranged in libraries, bookstores, social reading organizations, and enterprises in Ningbo, with over 10,000 reading activities being carried out throughout the year.
At present, with over 200 libraries of various types, over 70 urban study rooms, over 200 digital reading libraries, and nearly 1,000 rural libraries, Ningbo has gradually developed a multi-dimensional and multi-level public reading space represented by book reading towns, urban study rooms, rural libraries, and working staff libraries.
From the “One Art for One Person” themed art popularization project, to such art popularization activities as the “cultural salons” by the Federation of Literary and Art Circles, and to cultural volunteer activities, the cultural section of Ningbo is integrating and enriching the daily lives of citizens with unprecedented vitality and diversity.
Ningbo’s efforts in building a strong “cultural city”
In the early days after the founding of the People’s Republic of China, there was an extreme shortage of public cultural service facilities. In 1949, there were only 55 public libraries and 21 museums in China.
Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, Ningbo has been promoting cultural construction through integrity and innovation, resulting in a significant increase in the city’s cultural soft power and cultural influence.
In recent years, a large number of public cultural facilities have been built and put into use, such as Ningbo Grand Theatre, Ningbo Art Gallery, Ningbo Museum, Ningbo Cultural Plaza, and Ningbo City Exhibition Hall.
In 2014, with the successful application of the Ningbo section of the Grand Canal as a World Cultural Heritage site, Ningbo was identified as a ‘world cultural heritage city”. In 2015, Tuoshan Weir was listed as a “world heritage site for irrigation projects”. In 2016, Ningbo was awarded the title of “a Cultural Capital in East Asian”, and the first Ningbo Characteristic Cultural Industry Expo was successfully held. In 2021, the Hemudu Site was included in the “Top 100 Archaeological Discoveries of the Century” in China.
Great achievements have also been made in cultural protection and inheritance. Since the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the restoration and protection work has never stopped for the Tianyi Pavilion, which has a history of over 400 years, and the wooden ancient building of the Baoguo Temple, which has a history of a thousand years.
Ningbo has built the brand of “Seeing Civilized China in Ningbo”, and rural cultural auditoriums have been built in all established villages throughout the city.
As of the end of 2023, there had been a total of 33 national key cultural relics protection units, 10 major state-owned museums, 28 representative items of national intangible cultural heritage, and 478 masterpieces of provincial and municipal intangible cultural heritage in Ningbo.