On March 7, the Liaoning Provincial Museum and the Suzhou Museum signed the “Memorandum on Deepening Exchanges and Cooperation” in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province. This memorandum marks a new stage of all-round and regular cooperation between the two museums, prompted by the upcoming “Special Exhibition of The Prosperous Suzhou”.
The two museums will establish a long-term cooperation mechanism, collaborating in areas such as exhibition exchanges, joint academic development, joint research on cultural and creative products, digital resource sharing, joint talent cultivation, and joint brand building. They will promote the institutionalization of mutual exhibit lending, the synergy of cultural and creative development, and the interoperability of digital resources, aiming to build a cross-regional platform for sharing cultural and museum resources.
The “Special Exhibition of The Prosperous Suzhou”, jointly curated by the two museums, will be held at the Suzhou Museum in mid-July. This exhibition will showcase 62 pieces of cultural relics, 49 of which will be provided by the Liaoning Provincial Museum. The exhibits will include the long painting scroll of The Prosperous Suzhou, Four Poems in Cursive Script by Zhang Xu, a renowned calligraphy master from Suzhou during the Tang Dynasty, and masterpieces by the “Four Masters of the Ming Dynasty” and the “Four Masters of the Qing Dynasty”, forming an exhibition content system that complements the collections of the northern and southern museums, and integrates their cultural heritages.
The national treasure-level cultural relic The Prosperous Suzhou, will return to Suzhou after 20 years, which presents a panoramic view of Suzhou’s society during the Qing Dynasty. With themes such as “Masterpieces of Cursive Script Masters”, and “Elegance of Wu-School Paintings” as its narrative threads, the exhibition will outline the cultural origins of Suzhou’s prosperity from an art historical perspective, not only focusing on the exhibition of artifacts, but also integrating education, cultural and creative development, and digital technology. In terms of digital empowerment, the two museums will jointly launch a large-scale VR immersive exhibition centered on The Prosperous Suzhou, allowing visitors to “step into” the scroll scene, and experience the bustling city life of 300 years ago. For public education, it will promote museum-school integration and active participation. In the aspect of cultural and creative development, it will build a multi-category cultural and creative product matrix covering lifestyle aesthetics, digital creativity, and joint branding with intangible cultural heritage (ICH), and project activities linking ICH and delicacies to extend the cultural consumption chain.
In 2027, the Liaoning Provincial Museum will introduce a Suzhou-themed exhibition, achieving a thorough presentation of Jiangnan culture in the Liaoning region. This collaboration between the Liaoning Provincial Museum and the Suzhou Museum will foster mutual learning and exchanges between “Liaohai Culture” and “Jiangnan Culture”, creating a new model of cross-regional cooperation among cultural and museum institutions in the new era.
