OCT. 10 this year marked the 90th anniversary of the founding of the Palace Museum in Beijing, the largest home of Chinese treasures in the world.

    The anniversary was celebrated both in Beijing and Taipei, home of the Taiwan Palace Museum which was built in 1965 to house the more than 650,000 documents and works of art the Kuomintang government took to Taiwan in 1948/49.

    The Beijing museum has 1.8 million items, including 603,000 ancient books and documents, 367,000 porcelain pieces, 181,000 pieces of embroidery and 75,000 items of calligraphy.

    It was founded Oct. 10, 1925 in the Forbidden City, the home of 24 emperors of the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties. It covers an area of 1.12 square kilometers and was built in 1420.

    To mark the anniversary, the Palace Museum is holding 18 exhibitions this year, increasing the number of pieces exhibited from 10,000 to nearly 15,000. It plans to open to visitors five new sites, bringing the total area accessible to them to 65 percent of the whole palace. Among the items on show is a painting 44 meters long that shows ceremonies during the reign of Emperor Kangxi (1661-1722).

    It is the world’s largest palace complex and wooden architectural building, with 9,000 temples, halls and rooms. It is also the most popular museum in the world, with over 15 million visitors last year. The Louvre comes in second with 9.2 million.

    “I can barely take a day off work all year,” said director Shan Jixiang. “In charge of such a museum with such complex needs, rich history and intense attention from the world, you cannot expect to sleep well.

    “About 28,000 manuscripts of poems written by Emperor Qianlong (1711-1799) were found last year in the palace. They were discovered in an unmarked box. Who knows how many more astonishing secrets are hidden here?” he said.

    Fung Ming-chu, director of the Taipei museum, said it would hold a series of events to mark the anniversary, including some jointly with the Beijing museum.

    “Ninety years is a long time for a person to live; it is a long time for a museum too,” she said. “I feel that it is a very important year. Every 10th year we have a celebration and a series of events. This year we will have joint events with the Palace Museum, including academic seminars and other plans. We will have a joint exhibition of the paintings of Italian Jesuit Guiseppe Castiglione. He came to China at the age of 28 and died in China at the age of 78. He was the first Western painter in China and mixed Chinese and Western styles.”

    The Palace Museum in Beijing is lending nine paintings, to which the Taipei museum will add some from its own collection.

    Mainland visitors have become an important part of the clientele of the Taipei museum. With the opening of direct air links in 2008, mass tourism from the mainland to Taiwan has boomed. The museum is always a priority for mainland visitors; up to 30 percent of the museum’s visitors are from the mainland.

    (SD-Agencies)