{"id":11824,"date":"2017-12-21T12:28:11","date_gmt":"2017-12-21T12:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.museunacional.cat\/?p=11824"},"modified":"2021-02-22T13:50:37","modified_gmt":"2021-02-22T13:50:37","slug":"digital-action-in-museums-of-china-palace-museum-of-beijing-and-others","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.museunacional.cat\/en\/digital-action-in-museums-of-china-palace-museum-of-beijing-and-others\/","title":{"rendered":"Digital action in museums of China: Palace Museum of Beijing and others"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Conxa Rod\u00e0<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Who could have told me that I\u2019d be returning to China one year on. This time invited by the Palace Museum<\/a> of the Forbidden City of Beijing, to participate in the CTIF\u00f2rum (Culture + Tech International Forum). An encounter based around museums and digital, where experiences were presented by Chinese museums and from around the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As on the previous occasion<\/a> in Shanghai, I was able to see first-hand how advanced they are in the implementation of digital technology at the service of interpretation and of users.<\/strong> Establishing connections, approaching the immense value to the public of their historic and artistic heritage of centuries and millennia is a clear priority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Palace<\/a>
Palace Museum, Forbidden City, Beijing<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Palace<\/a>
Photos: Conxa Rod\u00e0<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Palace Museum<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It was a great satisfaction to hear the director of the Palace Museum, Shan Jixiang, with more than 16 million visitors a year, -an average of 40,000 visitors a day!- saying that an extensive use of digital technology allows them to preserve, present and promote the heritage as well as optimising the visitor services and building a network of information at their service<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Shan<\/a>
Shan Jixiang, director of the Palace Museum explaining the digital dimension<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The conference attendees had the luxury of visiting the Digital Hall in the evening behind closed doors, with virtual reality devices, and above all an interactive video wall on which pieces of the collection were projected, which users could handle on a touch screen in 3D reproduction and download it onto the mobile.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A work, the curator responsible commented to me, which was the result of 11 years of documentation and 3D digitisation, now made available to the visitors.  A similar project to the famous Collection Wall \u2013 Gallery One<\/a> of the Art Museum of Cleveland, but much less known amongst us. For the time being, it offers a selection of 200 objects from a collection of more than 1.8 million pieces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Feng<\/a>
Feng Nai\u2019en, Deputy Director of The Palace Museum presenting the Digital Hall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Visitors<\/a>
Visitors can interact and rotate the objects in 3D<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In conversation with the Deputy Director of the museum, Feng Nai\u2019en and the Deputy Head of Online Digital Media, Ying Zhuang, I was able to find out that in the digital area work around 70 people. Their priority now is to concentrate on the collection data and on the content offered to the public.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"DPM<\/a>
DPM Collections<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Within the process of improvements for the visitor favoured by technology, the Palace Museum has established access only with the purchase of tickets online in advance.  In this way, practically all the queues for access, which had reached up to 3 or 4 hours, have been eliminated.  It is without doubt an improvement in the service for visitors. For foreign visitors, however, it is more complicated given that the website is only in Chinese and it is necessary to have some system of Chinese payment and it therefore requires intermediation to manage the purchasing online.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It should be mentioned that the audio-guide of the Palace Museum is accessible in 40 languages! And if you want to do the full tour it lasts 4 or 5 hours. The daily limit of access to the venue has been established at 80,000 visitors a day, to avoid peaks as happened some time ago during the national festivities when they surpassed 120,000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With the aim of opening up to the world, the Palace Museum has entered the Google Art project<\/a>, with a hundred of its masterpieces. And they have managed to establish a top level technological partnership<\/strong> with Tencent, the main provider of Internet services in the Chinese market and promoter, amongst others, of WeChat, the multi-purpose social network that provides in just one app similar services to those offered by Facebook, WhatsApp, ecommerce, taxis, payment by mobile and much more, all integrated in just one app with an absolutely massive use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talks and practical cases<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The presentations were given based around 3 forums:<\/p>\n\n\n\n