Modern technology brings relics from Palace Museum to life

Reporter: Chen Ziqi; narrated by Luo Laiming

The Forbidden City is a world-famous museum and preserves an astonishing 42 percent of all of China's historical relics. [Photo: from VCG]

The Forbidden City, also known as the Palace Museum, is a palace complex in downtown Beijing. It was once the imperial palace and served 24 emperors from the Ming Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty. It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1987 and is internationally recognized as one of the five most important palaces in the world, with Versailles in France, Buckingham Palace in Britain, the Kremlin in Russia and the White House in the US.

Precious jade article displayed in the Forbidden City [Photo: from VCG]

Nowadays, the Forbidden City is home to roughly 1.86 million precious historical relics, and among them, the North Song Dynasty masterpiece Along the River during the Qingming Festival, painted by Zhang Zeduan, is reckoned to have the highest value. 

Along the River during the Qingming Festival is a panoramic painting, depicting the daily life of people from the Song period at the capital, Bianjing, today’s Kaifeng in Henan province. It is only a small part the entire painting. [Photo: from VCG]

The original masterpiece is static, and it seems that the general public only has a superficial understanding of the art and rarely knows what information the painting is attempting to disseminate. In recent years, the Forbidden City has been cooperating with technology companies to make these silent, historical relics come alive, in a bid to meet the demands of an increasing number of Chinese cultural enthusiasts and let them enjoy a more pleasant visual experience. 

Digital version of Along the River during the Qingming Festival was exhibited in the China Arts Museum in Shanghai on Feb. 24 2018. [Photo: from IC]

In 2016, the Forbidden City and the Phoenix Satellite Television jointly launched a project---the Arts Exhibition with High-tech Interaction. The painting, which is 5.28 meters long, has been digitalized and enriched with additional information, including relevant animation, music and asides.

The digitalized version of the Along the River during the Qingming Festival will be shown on the giant screen in an exhibition room with an area of 1000 square meters. Visitors wearing VR glasses will take a boat and explore the neighborhood of the Bian River in Henan province that is depicted by the painting. It takes 40 minutes to finish the visual feast. The exhibition will officially open to the public in the Archery Pavilion of the Forbidden City in May 2018.

Wang Yamin is deputy director of the Forbidden City. He emphasizes that the core mission of the project is to help visitors get a more comprehensive understanding of the famous painting by seeking assistance from modern technology.

"The painting Along the River during the Qingming Festival is recognized as one of the most significant historical relics representing the Chinese civilization and its profound history,” Wang Yamin says, “The general public is not expert, so it is hard for them to totally understand the meaning of the painting. So to help them understand the relics, we have cooperated with Phoenix Satellite Television to use high-tech to make the painting more approachable."

[Photo: from IC]

All staff devoted to this creative project have received thorough training about Chinese traditional paintings, and all the additional content has been created strictly based on the original work. For instance, visitors are able to glean information about the painting's passersby in the open market, like what occupations they had, their clothes, hair styles, and a brief introduction to the architecture. Some parts of the painting processed with multi-media and immersive VR technology will be animated once the VR glasses have detected that visitors are looking at them. Wang Yamin says numerous efforts have been made from different sectors to ensure visitors get an overall knowledge of this precious Chinese cultural treasure.

"All the content we added has been approved by experts. To achieve the necessary virtual effects, we have invited the same technical team that participated in displaying the Along the River during the Qingming Festival during the Shanghai Expo to join us. We hope we can make it a long-term project, because it's not just one exhibition for a short-period of time, but also a form of visual experience. In the future, we will consider reconstructing some shops, or even the entire open market in the painting. I believe in the end this project will benefit tens of thousands of people. "

Nowadays visitors are able to interact with the historical relics in the Forbidden City, under support of modern technology, in a bid to help people have a more overall understanding about national treasures. [Photo: from IC]

To ensure the speed of developing modern technology meets demand, the launch of the Joint Innovation Lab was announced during the International Forum on Culture + Science and Technology in November 2017. It was held in the Forbidden City, attracting experts and scholars from the world's top five museums and domestic high ranking museums. 

A family was checking details of a relic in the Forbidden City in Beijing. [Photo: from IC]

The lab will discover how to adopt advanced digital technology in the fields of cultural relics protection and world cultural heritage preservation. Wang Yamin, deputy director of the Forbidden City, says modern technology will be used to make contributions in this regard. He believes this is the best way to celebrate the upcoming 600^th anniversary of the building of the Forbidden City.

"Director of the Forbidden City Shan Jixiang once said we need to pass down the Forbidden City perfectly to our future generations. The Forbidden City is preserving nearly 42% of the entire precious relics of the nation, so it's a symbol and icon that represents Chinese history and civilization,” Wang Yamin says, “Nowadays, our task is to help Chinese people appreciate so many valuable relics and arts by establishing a digital community. For example, if someone is interested in one particular relic displayed in the Forbidden City, all the information about it can be found online or via applications on smart phones."

In 2015, the Forbidden City released an application to introduce a painting Han Banquet Map to the general public. Users are able to listen to audio about the story, as well as the tones played by the performer depicting in the painting. [Photo: from IC]

In recent years, it has seen that an increasing number of Chinese cultural enthusiasts have waited in long queues to buy tickets when there's an exhibition to be held in the Forbidden City. It has been reported by the media that some visitors waited for more than ten hours for the last exhibition of the Along the River during the Qingming Festival in 2015. To help more people get easier access to cultural displays, the Forbidden City has released a series of applications on smart phones, to let visitors experience a more joyful way of exploring cultural exhibitions. It allows users to see the appearance of the items, as well as other details, by either reading the background information, looking at images, listening to audio or watching videos, depending on preferences.

Wang Yamin says users also save transport costs in going to the Forbidden City, and they will have nearly the same visual experience with the assistance of VR technology as physically coming to the display room.

"We have released six or seven different types of applications. As the display of the Forbidden City is still developing, we will release other apps to match users' needs and demands. It is also beneficial in promoting Chinese historical relics and history."

The concept behind these innovative projects is to bring all the precious historical relics and ancient articles to life, with their more obscure words becoming easier to understand. Wang Yamin says he has faith that the creative measures employed by the Forbidden City will open up a new era to popularize profound Chinese culture and history across the country and to the rest of the world.