With a rich collection of national treasures, Liaoning Provincial Museum draws a great number of visitors from all over China. During holidays and festivals, the museum is always ready to greet visitors from around the country waiting in long queues outside. This year, Liaoning Provincial Museum will continue to prepare a series of special exhibitions for visitors, launching eight major exhibitions from May to December.
Affinity of Mountains and Seas·Echoes of the Desert Sands—Meeting Dunhuang in Liaoning
Exhibition Time: May 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 21 and 22, 3F
With a legacy spanning over a millennium, Dunhuang culture embodies profound cultural connotations, majestic historical depth, and exquisite artistic imagery. It not only epitomizes the fusion of ethnic and religious cultures, but also marks the historical imprint of friendly exchanges and the convergence of diverse civilizations along the ancient Silk Road. Affinity of Mountains and Seas·Echoes of the Desert Sands—Meeting Dunhuang in Liaoning is this year’s key exhibition jointly launched by Liaoning Provincial Museum and Dunhuang Academy, which is the largest Dunhuang culture special exhibition in Northeast China so far. Based on the systematic sorting and exploration of Dunhuang documents in the museum, this exhibition aims to promote Dunhuang culture and Mogao spirit, enhance the public’s cultural cognition, and strengthen the protection and inheritance of Chinese cultural heritage through rich content and diverse forms.
Fresh Look—Shiwan Kiln Ceramic Statues in Liaoning Provincial Museum
Exhibition Time: June 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 5, 1F
Shiwan Kiln boasts a long history of ceramic making. The perfect mastering of rich and varied glaze techniques foregrounds its multi-colored glazed ceramic products in the ceramic industry, earning the reputation of “peerless Shiwan ceramics in the world”. During the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties, Shiwan ceramics were mostly shaped into figures, animals, mountain gods and tiled roof ornaments. Among them, the figure artistic ceramics were nicknamed “Shiwan dolls”, making Shiwan ceramics a local symbol and renowned at home and abroad.
Liaoning Provincial Museum houses many exquisite ceramic works from “Guangzhou People’s Art Commune”, which portray figures and animals, and have a strong contemporary style. In addition to displaying the unique Shiwan ceramic artworks, the exhibition will also unveil the contributions and significant achievements made by the Communist Party of China in protecting and inheriting the traditional handicrafts.
Exhibition of Unearthed Relics from Mural Tombs of Han and Wei Dynasties in Liaoyang
Exhibition Time: July 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 4, 1F
Dating back to the late Han Dynasty (206 BC-AD 220) and the Three Kingdoms period (220-280), the mural tombs of the Han and Wei (one of the Three Kingdoms) dynasties in Liaoyang are situated in places such as Bangtaizi, Beiyuan, and Sandaohao on both sides of the Taizi River in the northern suburbs of Liaoyang. The cultural site has been designated as part of the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units. Built with light cyan stone slabs, the vaults inside were all painted with murals. This exhibition is the third project of the museum’s Liaoning regional culture series, hoping to reproduce the unique charm of Liaoning’s regional cultures more than 1,700 years ago through the joint display of mural copies and unearthed cultural relics from the mural tombs in Liaoyang.
Long-Standing Artifact Patterns—Traditional Chinese Culture Education Exhibition
Exhibition Time: July 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 20, 3F
With ancient artifacts as a carrier, this exhibition will focus on various kinds of traditional Chinese artifact patterns, following the main line of depicting the artistic life scenes of ancient Chinese people. It will exhibit artifacts and their patterns that highlight the rich connotations of Chinese culture from five perspectives, such as palaces and pavilions, and ancient Chinese people’s daily routines, leisurely and elegant living atmosphere, traditional etiquette, and spiritual world. Via exquisite graphic display boards and immersive digital experience interactions, it allows teenagers to step into the world of ancient art, and admire the artistic glamor of traditional artifact patterns.
Liaoning Forges a Strong Sense of Community for the Chinese Nation: Cultural Relics and Ancient Books Exhibition
Exhibition Time: July 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 1 and 2, 1F
People of all ethnic groups across China have collectively developed the vast territory of the motherland, created a unified multi-ethnic country, written the glorious history of China, developed the brilliant Chinese culture, and cultivated the great national spirit. Adhering to the main line of forging a strong sense of community for the Chinese nation, this exhibition will center on cultural relics to deeply engage with the history of exchanges, communication, and fusion among ethnic groups in Liaoning, and the unique cultures formed in the province through the integration of cultural resources across time, regions and categories.
Exhibition of Exquisite Ancient Chinese Lacquerware
Exhibition Time: September 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 5, 1F
Lacquerware is an important category of ancient Chinese arts and crafts. The Chinese nation was the first to discover lacquer, apply lacquer, and use lacquer to coat utensils. According to historical records, Yao and Shun, two legendary monarchs in ancient China, used lacquerware as food and drink utensils, and Yu, the founding emperor of the Xia Dynasty (2205-1782 BC), employed lacquerware as sacrificial utensils. Archaeological data show that lacquer crafting originated in the Neolithic Age, and has continued to improve through historical development. Until the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), the diversity, crafts, and style designs of lacquerware reached their peak. This exhibition will showcase exquisite ancient Chinese lacquerware hailed as “solid in quality and brilliant in design”.
China in Poetry and Painting
Exhibition Time: December 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 20, 21 and 22, 3F
Traditional Chinese paintings unfold unfettered free imagery on pieces of paper; classical Chinese poems imply far-reaching profundity within lines of concise words. A major feature of Chinese literati paintings lies in the combination of poetry, calligraphy, and painting, which has also brought forth “poems on paintings” and “poetic paintings”. As the poetic and pictorial splendors complement each other, the art of poetry and painting has therefore become a typical representative of the treasures of Chinese literature and art. This exhibition will present more than 100 pieces of ancient paintings with poems, to highlight Chinese people’s views of the universe, the world, society and morality to the world.
Majestic Streams Merge into the Ocean—Exhibition of Paintings by Zhang Shuqi
Exhibition Time: December 2025
Location: Exhibition Hall 1, 1F
Zhang Shuqi (1900-1957) is a modern Chinese art educator and noted flower-and-bird painter, known as one of the “Three Prominent Painters of Jinling (now Nanjing)” together with Xu Beihong and Liu Zigu. Zhang devoted his lifetime to the creation and research of flower-and-bird paintings. He had a very eclectic pursuit in art, and ingeniously drew on the sketching techniques of Western paintings, thus creating extraordinary and unrestrained artworks that appeal to both refined and popular tastes. This exhibition is one of the exhibition series of overseas Chinese artists at Liaoning Provincial Museum. It will interpret Zhang Shuqi and his artworks based on his three different identities in life—flower-and-bird painter, art educator, and messenger of cultural exchanges between China and the West, and further reflect his life path from learning and teaching art to art exchanges.
