National Museum seeks new ways to draw attention

Before International Museum Day the National Museum of China, together with the six other country-level museums, logged onto Douyin, a Chinese app that publishes short videos, and published creative short videos to draw the public's attention.

In the era of mobile internet, museums are seeking new ways to meet the public's need for traditional culture, and arouse the attention and enthusiasm of young people for the museum. Short video apps may be one such method.

Seven country-level museums, including the National Museum of China, Hunan Provincial Museum, Nanjing Museum, Shaanxi History Museum, Zhejiang Provincial Museum, Shanxi Museum and Guangdong Museum, logged onto Douyin and published two short videos named Wonderful Night at the Museum, Let’s Dance, a Magical Opening and The First Contest of Drama Queen at the Museum, in which cultural relics revealed lives after the museums close, speaking, dancing and singing.

The account of the museums attracted 360,000 followers in one day, and the two short videos won more than 485,000 likes.

Followers wrote comments on the videos, such as "Wow, I have become a fan of the museums and the cultural relics!" "I watched so many times. It is too interesting to stop" and "I think the cultural relics are adorable," responding well to the relics in the videos.

The seven museums also held a contest for creative videos of museums on Douyin, hoping the traditional Chinese culture and museum culture will be promoted via submissions.

Shan Jixiang, curator of the Palace Museum, also known as the Forbidden City, said: "Can the cultural relics only be placed on display? I think the answer is no. The most important thing is that they should integrate into the real life."

The National Museum will publish a "Report on public impact assessment and ranking analysis of Chinese museums (2017)" to analyze the public image of 131 first-class museums in China.

As another commemorative activity for International Museum Day carried out by the National Museum, The General Catalogue of the Collections in National Museum of China was published on May 18. Over 250,000 pieces of collection data was revealed to the public for the first time.

The first part of the catalogue includes 251,523 pieces of data and 306,447 objects. There are 198,110 pieces of data and 200,272 objects from ancient times, including porcelain, coins, and items from archaeological excavations; 49,163 pieces of data and 55,384 objects from modern times, containing a variety of historical and artistic objects; and 4,250 pieces of data and 50,791 objects from ancient books, including both rare and standard editions.

The National Museum launched a survey on movable cultural relics of the museum in March 2014, and finished it after three years. Based on the results of the survey, the museum published the catalog, with information like name, age, serial number, and images of the objects, to meet the needs of the general public for information retrieval and research on the collections of the museum.

According to the museum, more information will be published in the future.