On the 10th, the International Seminar of Beijing Wenbo Development Think Tank 2023 was held in Beijing. With the theme of “Being a City as a Museum”, the event invited authoritative experts from the museum industry at home and abroad to express their views on the importance of museums to urban development.
The event invited internationally renowned museum research experts from Italy, Germany and the United States to deliver keynote speeches, introducing an international perspective into the construction of Beijing Museum City. At the same time, authoritative experts in the domestic museum industry are invited to express their views around three exchange seminars and build a platform for consultation and advice.
He Xiaolei, deputy director of the Department of Museums and Social Cultural Relics of the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, said that in the past “May 1” holiday, the museum fever once again warmed up. More than 50 million people from all over the country entered the museum, and 255 exhibitions were held in Beijing, with an audience of 1.48 million.
He pointed out that the core task of the museum city is to do a good job in construction, governance, opening up, display, service and integration. It is necessary to break through the boundaries of spatial scope and highlight the integrity. The overall layout focuses on high-quality resources, focusing on supporting the priority development of museums with resource endowments, conforming to urban cultural characteristics and distinctive features, avoiding homogeneous and disorderly repeated construction, encouraging the development of industry museums and university museums, and forming a number of internationally influential museum settlement brands and cultural activities.
At the same time, it is necessary to open up cultural bases, combine urban cultural heritage, garden landscape, historical streets and old hutongs, take the city of museums as an extension of Beijing’s historical axis, reshape and rebuild urban space with museum elements, cultivate museum block lines that are continuous from ancient times to modern times, echo each other and circulate through, and form a number of characteristic museum cultural ecological circles and living circles.
In addition, it is necessary to inject scientific and technological strength, highlight convenience, strengthen the integration of smart museums and smart cities, build a museum digital map and centralized reservation system, and upgrade supporting services by means of artificial intelligence and other scientific and technological means; Innovate in co-construction and sharing, guide urban residents to participate in museum construction and management, promote the museum’s deep integration into urban life and community culture, and guide the public to regard the museum as a high-level cultural experience after shopping and entertainment.
Chen Mingjie, director of Beijing Cultural Relics Bureau, pointed out that the city of museums means that museums should be integrated into all aspects of economy and society. As one of the cities with the largest number of museums in the world, Beijing has “integrated” museums into the city in recent years through activities such as museums entering the campus and entering the community. In May this year, Beijing opened the first museum activity month, attracting hundreds of museums to participate. He said that it is necessary to constantly bring forth the old and innovate, and build a museum city through the addition of new formats, new technologies and new ideas.
At the seminar, the Beijing Wenbo Development Think Tank established a strategic cooperative relationship with the Research and Exchange Center of the International Museum Association to jointly carry out forward-looking policy research, targeted decision-making consultation, scientific theoretical innovation and compounding in the museum field..International talent training continues to help the high-quality development of the museum.
It is understood that as an important part of the first Beijing Museum Activity Month, this seminar is an active practice for professional think tanks in the field of cultural relics to participate in the cultural relics work in Beijing, and will continue to carry out a series of international seminars, form an international exchange brand of think tanks, and tell the story of cultural relics in Beijing, the ancient capital, bringing a new global vision to the construction of Beijing Museum City and continuously promoting the exchange and mutual learning of Chinese civilization.
The forum was hosted by Beijing Cultural Relics Bureau, China Cultural Relics Newspaper and Beijing Museum Society, co-hosted by Beijing Wenbo Development Center and Research and Exchange Center of International Museum Association, and co-organized by China Arts and Crafts Museum (China Intangible Cultural Heritage Museum), China Knowledge Network and Beijing Chaoyang District Culture and Tourism Bureau. Reporter Xu Jing