What's new
The Queen is coming fingers crossed
The Queen's Helen Mirren may visit China at the end of September to help promote the film's screening in China, according to the film's Chinese distributor, Huaxia Films.
The Queen, in which Mirren plays Queen Elizabeth II, began to screen in Beijing on August 31, to mark the 10-year anniversary of Princess Diana's death. Filmgoers in other cities have to wait about one month to see the film.
Mirren has received the invitation from Huaxia, but whether she will make the journey is still uncertain, says staff of the company.
Where silver means coming first
Silver of the Stars - a unique collection of contemporary silver commissioned by the Incorporation of Goldsmiths of the City of Edinburgh to mark the 550th anniversary of hallmarking in Scotland - opened at the Beijing World Art Museum on Tuesday.
The opening coincides with a symposium which will bring together experts in Scottish art and silver from Edinburgh University, Glasgow School of Art and the National Museums of Scotland, with their counterparts from the Academy of Arts & Design at Tsinghua University.
Michael Laing, Deacon of the Incorporation of Silversmiths of the City of Edinburgh, says that although the exhibition has opened to huge acclaim around the world, nothing can match the excitement of being the first-ever exhibition of Scottish applied art in China.
Leaning out of Africa
The Institute of African Studies (IAS) was opened on Sunday by the China Education Association for International Exchange and Zhejiang Normal University. This is the first comprehensive African studies institute to open in China.
IAS currently runs three centers on African education - African economy, African politics and international relations. An African information consultation center, newsletter and yearbook for African studies and multimedia studio will soon be set up.
The founding of the IAS is also a significant initiative by Zhejiang Normal University to strengthen its African studies discipline, promote educational aid to Africa, and enhance academic cooperation and exchange between China and Africa.
Young ink artists
The prize-winning works of the Fifth Lichang Young Chinese Ink Paintings Contest are on show at the National Art Museum of China in downtown Beijing.
On display are about 140 selected works from more than 3,000 entries by young Chinese ink painters from across the country, said Chen Yigong, an organizer and secretary-general with China Literature and Arts Foundation.
Having created mostly traditional Chinese ink paintings, the painters express their ideas about the fast-changing life in China today in the forms of figure painting, landscape painting and birds-and-flowers paintings, Chen said.
Featured artists include Chen Lusheng, Zhou Jingxin, Fang Xiang, Chao Hai, Lin Rongsheng, Lu Fuhai and Fang Chuqi, among others.
The exhibition runs until Friday in Beijing.
Dance fever scheduled to grip the nation
Co-produced by Chongqing Satellite TV and MTV Networks China, MTV Dance to Kill, an innovative dance show that consists of finding dancers from all over China, will kick off later this month. Hosted by the Taiwanese hip-hop star Jeffrey Kung (pictured left), the show will host auditions in six major cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Wuhan and Harbin, to search for 60 dancers to compete in four weeks of competition where Kung, the celebrity judges and audience will determine who'll make the quarter finals. These remaining dancers will then compete in a round of head-to-head dance battles which will eventually see three of them move to fight it out in the grand finals in Beijing in January.
The winner will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to the United States and will meet Justin Timberlake in person.
China Daily
(China Daily 09/06/2007 page18)
