One of China's most famous paintings, Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival created by the famous painter Zhang Zeduan during the Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127), faithfully reflects the prosperous and harmonious life of people in Kaifeng city of Henan province, the capital city at that time, becoming the highlight of Kaifeng's brilliant culture now. In the database recording Henan's journey to Xiaokang (a moderately prosperous society), there is an animated video about the prosperity of Bianjing (today's Kaifeng) in the Northern Song Dynasty, just like a live version of the famous Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival.
Click on the video
"With the falling of the Northern Song Dynasty, Kaifeng, an international metropolis, has gradually become a local central city of Henan. However, Kaifeng is a symbol of the prosperity of the Song Dynasty and a peak of the Chinese civilization, so it is still a place for the public to experience the Song Dynasty culture and learn the Chinese civilization. The importance of Kaifeng has never changed from this perspective." During an interview with dahe.cn on November 23, Dr Liu Tao, head of the Department of Cultural Industry Management of Henan University's School of Cultural Industry and Tourism Management and a researcher at Henan University's Collaborative Innovation Center of the Yellow River Civilization, talked about Kaifeng's development dividends brought by its profound history and culture accumulated as an imperial capital city for 8 dynasties. "Today, against the background of promoting cultural city construction and new urbanization development, the profound cultural accumulations of the Northern Song Dynasty have become the main resources for Kaifeng to enhance its special cultural charm and quality," said Liu Tao.
In the next five years, Henan will strive to significantly improve the quality of cultural development, deepen the popularity of core socialist values, highlight the influence of Central Plains culture, promote the protection and utilization of cultural heritage, make cultural tourism and innovation a pillar industry, and thus remarkably raise its level of civilization, according to the 11th Party Congress of Henan Province.
Kaifeng, an imperial capital city for 8 dynasties in history, represents the brilliant culture of the Central Plains. Even in today's Kaifeng, there are still many elements of the Song Dynasty, such as folk drum dance, woodcut New Year pictures, Chinese opera, Kaifeng embroidery, etc. Those distinctive folk customs make visitors feel as if they even came back to Bianjing a thousand years ago.
Kaifeng's rich tourism resources, the Qingming cultural festival in spring, lotus cultural festival in summer, chrysanthemum cultural festival in autumn, etc., have made its increasingly vigorous cultural tourism a pillar industry. Statistically, Kaifeng had received 45.102 million tourists with a revenue of 27.74 billion yuan by the end of October in 2020. According to Liu Tao, during the 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-2025), Kaifeng will accelerate the integrated development of cultural tourism and innovation, build itself into an international cultural tourism city, protect/inherit/carry forward the Yellow River culture, promote cultural undertakings and industries, continuously raise its level of civilization and build itself into a world-renowned historic and cultural capital at a high level to reshape its cultural soft power into a backbone of high-quality development. (Chinese source: dahe.cn Reporter: Liu Sijia Translator: Zhao Hanqing Poster: Wang Junyi Proofreader: Bai Yujie)
