China News Service, Beijing, April 20 (Reporter Ying Ni) "The Ballad of the Forbidden City" entered the country in one second, and the stage effects of the Forbidden City were visited in person. AR and holographic projection technology presented the precious collections of the Palace Museum, and the drama, stage and music were perfect. Fusion... The reporter learned from the Palace Museum on the 20th that from May 1st to 5th, the Palace Museum's first musical children's drama "Luduan" based on the auspicious beast "Luduan" of the Palace Museum will be launched at the Kwai Tsing Theater in Hong Kong.
Stills of "Lu Duan". Photo courtesy of the Palace Museum
It is reported that the prototype of "Lu Duan" is the cloisonné enamel fragrance Lu Duan from the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty. This cultural relic has a deep connection with Hong Kong. When the Hong Kong Palace Museum opened, it was one of the first batch of cultural relics from the Palace Museum to be unveiled at the Hong Kong Palace Museum.
"Lu Duan" is produced by the Palace Museum and took three years to create. "甔" is a pictographic character, and its meaning in "Cihai" is a variant and different reading of "一角". Luduan can travel ten thousand miles in a day and eight thousand miles at night. He is proficient in four languages and is quick and sharp. He is a symbol of auspiciousness - the Chinese unicorn. As the first musical children's drama produced by the Palace Museum, "Lu Duan" tells the story of the protection, inheritance, innovation and development of cultural relics in the new era.
In the play, Luduan, who is over 400 years old, has a childlike innocence full of curiosity about the world. He wants to understand the larger world and the farther future. Gao Xiaoduan is the grandson of Lao Gao from the Forbidden City’s Palace History Department. Growing up in the information age, he is more willing to accept the fragmented information brought by short videos. The unexpected encounter of two "children" set off a journey to explore the Forbidden City, which also launched a "debate" and thinking about classical culture and contemporary trends, historical persistence and future aspirations.
Stills of "Lu Duan". Photo courtesy of the Palace Museum
In addition, the national treasure-level Jinou Yonggu Cup, the Southern Song Dynasty Shen Zifan's tapestry "Plum Magpie Picture" and the Jin Dynasty calligrapher Lu Ji's cursive calligraphy work "Pingfu Tie" also played important roles in the play. , each piece of handed down treasure is no longer just a cultural symbol, but has a vivid vitality. The "Royal Cat" of the Forbidden City, which has long been known to the audience, will also appear in the play.
The play also shows the history of the Palace Museum's "cultural relics moving southward". The display of precious video materials allows the audience to feel the admirable spirit of generations of "guardians" of the Palace Museum who are not well known. The line that is often recited in the play, "For future generations, the treasure will last forever" is a common inscription on bronze vessels, implying that the artifacts will be passed down forever, and that future generations will continue to remember and cherish the merits and honors of their ancestors. As a musical children's drama that tells the story of the Forbidden City from a child's perspective, "Lu Duan" cleverly transforms the cultural relics of the Forbidden City into cute and interesting characters with different personalities, making the cultural relics truly "alive" on the stage. This innovative format makes the play not only loved by children, but also appreciated by adult audiences.
It is worth mentioning that in 2022, the Palace Museum will select more than 900 collections from 1.86 million collections to start a "journey southward" and appear at the opening exhibition of the Hong Kong Palace Museum to interpret the Forbidden City and traditional culture from a contemporary perspective. The cloisonné enamel aromatherapy Luduan from the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty is one of them. During its exhibition in Hong Kong, it attracted the attention and love of Hong Kong citizens. After the cultural relic was returned to the Forbidden City, another cultural relic related to "Luduan" - the "Sapphire Luduan Incense Furnace" collected by the Palace Museum was displayed in the "Everything in the Forbidden City: Architecture, Collections and Cultural Heritage" exhibition hall of the Hong Kong Palace Museum. The exhibition period is from July 1, 2023 to May 20, 2024.
"Lu Duan" performance poster in Hong Kong. Photo courtesy of the Palace Museum
It is reported that the performance of the musical children's drama "Lu Duan" of the Palace Museum in Hong Kong is hosted by the Palace Museum and co-organized by the Hong Kong Leisure and Cultural Services Department. In addition, Beijing OCT Grand Theater's resident version of "Lu Duan" will also be performed in Beijing on April 20 and May 1 to 3. (End)
