Shanghai display bridges East and West

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Preparations hit

The exhibition was conceived in 2015, when Yang visited the Guimet museum in Paris. He saw a digital representation of the domed ceilings at the Santos Palace in Portugal, decorated with some 300 Chinese porcelain plates. Yang and directors of the French museum discussed staging an international exhibition to show how Chinese porcelain was used in European courts centuries ago.

Preparations for the display started in 2019, and it was originally due to open in October last year, but the pandemic disrupted these plans.

Peng Tao, director of the ceramics department at the Shanghai Museum, said: "It turned out to be a highly difficult and complicated exhibition to stage. We encountered unprecedented challenges and setbacks in preparing for it."

As the pandemic continued, many of the museums' employees worked from home, but there were communication problems and assignments were delayed, Peng said.

The preparation period was repeatedly extended, but "we gained more time to take different perspectives of the curatorial work, delve deep into the academic and cultural content of the exhibits, and tell better stories about them," he said. "We believe visitors will find the exhibition different from those we have staged previously on the same subject."

Lu Minghua, former director of the ceramics department at the Shanghai Museum, said it is the seventh exhibition staged by the institution to feature porcelain for export.

The first such display was held at the venue in 1992, he said. The ongoing exhibition not only features items from museums at home and abroad, but also reveals "what happened after China's porcelain reached the West," Lu said.

A number of important pieces from several renowned museums are on public display in China for the first time, and it is also the country's first comprehensive exhibition of ancient porcelain from Japan and the Middle East, he said.

Bringing these treasured items to China during the pandemic was a huge challenge. Due to the nation's quarantine measures, many overseas museums found it impossible to send staff members to accompany exhibits during transportation.

Yang said before the exhibition opened on Oct 29: "We asked these museums to send their valuable items to China unaccompanied. The institutions extended the highest level of trust to the Shanghai Museum, thanks to many years of good partnerships and close collaboration. Eleven of the 15 overseas museums in the original plan agreed with such an arrangement. They did everything they could to make it happen."

For example, he said the Guimet museum had to apply for special permission from the French Ministry of Culture for items to travel unaccompanied to China, while directors of the British Museum reached a similar arrangement.

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