A work created by Lin Fengmian in 1950.

What's on in SZ — exhibitions, shows

A poster of "The Golden Cangue."

A poster of "Hamlet." File photos unless otherwise stated

Exhibitions

Contemporary art

The "Recreating Spiritual Realm — Contemparary Art Exhibition" invited six contemporary artists — Chen Baoyang, Deng Yuejun, Gao Shiqiang, Li Shun, Wang Zhigang, and Zheng Da, to creatively carry out contemporary transformation of traditional culture and technology, combine technology and art, creatively display traditional ideas and aesthetic concepts, and extend traditional art in modern civilization in an artistic way.

Different from the general "art + technology" exhibition, the artists in this exhibition use a variety of new technologies and languages to present traditional culture in a multi-sensory presentation. The exhibition includes such sections as landscape paintings, flower and bird paintings, figure paintings, as well as sounds from insect chirping, flowing water, and wind, from which we can feel that digital aesthetics has made artistic creation more diverse, free, and open.

Dates: Through Nov. 24

Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (closed on Mondays)

Venue: Shenzhen Art Museum, Longhua District

Metro: Line 4 or 6 to Hongshan Station, Exit A1 

Illumination exhibition

"Illumination • A Thematic Exhibition on the History of Illustration" is the first special exhibition in the country to systematically present the historical context of illustration. It selects more than 200 illustration collections from Shenzhen Truth-seeking Illustration Museum, including a large number of precious grass paintings, pictorials, prints, manuscripts, ancient illustrations, and physical ancient books.

This exhibition takes the perspective of looking back at the history of illustration, and extracts the representative scientific and technological progress, representative events, and representative illustrators in different regions of China and the West along the context of the times. It also traces the trajectory of illustration art from ancient times to the early 20th century across the long river of culture and history, and concisely presents the development and evolution of illustration art design in the context of various eras.

Dates: Through Nov. 3

Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (closed on Mondays)

Venue: Shenzhen Art Museum, Longhua District

Metro: Line 4 or 6 to Hongshan Station, Exit A1 

Classic works

The "Journey to the Rebirth of Artworks" exhibition showcases 29 classic works by five outstanding artists: Xu Beihong, Liu Haisu, Lin Fengmian, Dai Ze, and Zhu Naizheng, showing the communication and integration between Chinese art and the world in the 20th century, as well as the understanding and practice of Western art from the perspective of these artists.

The exhibition selects the works of the artists who copied classic Western oil paintings and conducted in-depth research and analysis of the works from the perspective of scientific inspection and restoration of artworks. It breaks the traditional mode of painting presentation and presents the process of rebirth of artworks to the audience with the research results of the integration of art and technology.

Dates: Through Nov. 17

Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. (closed on Mondays) 

Venue: Shenzhen Museum of Contemporary Art and Urban Planning, Futian District

Metro: Line 3 or 4 to Children's Palace Station, Exit A2

Performances

'The Golden Cangue'

"The Golden Cangue" is a famous novel in the history of Chinese literature and has received high praise from critics. Shortly after the publication of the novel, renowned Chinese literati Fu Lei praised it as the most complete work of Zhang Ailing, who is also knowned across the globe as Eileen Chang. At the very least, it should be listed as one of the most beautiful harvests in our literary world, Fu commented.

The script of the "The Golden Cangue" play was penned by Wang Anyi, who is another successor of the Shanghai School of Literature after Zhang. The play was also joined by Ann Hui, best director at the 6th Hong Kong Film Awards, and Jiao Yuan, the best actress in Shanghai Jing’an Modern Drama Valley. 

Time: 8 p.m., Nov. 2 

Venue: Shenzhen Poly Theater, Nanshan District

Metro: Line 2 or 11 to Houhai Station, Exit E1

'Hamlet' 

One of the best tragedies by William Shakespeare, "Hamlet" has complex characters and rich and perfect tragic artistic techniques, representing the highest achievement of Western Renaissance literature. 

Founded in 1980, TNT Theater in the United Kingdom is the world's most touring English-language theater company, with thousands of performances staged in more than 20 countries around the world for its Shakespeare series.

Time: 3 p.m., Dec. 8

Venue: Pingshan Theater, Pingshan District

Metro: Line 14 to Pingshan Square Station, Exit D1

New Year's Concert

The Vienna Royal Symphony Orchestra is a well-known symphony orchestra in the European music scene, representing the brilliant achievements of Austria orchestras. In addition to giving concerts in Austria, the orchestra is invited to perform in countries around the world every year, and to date the orchestra has traveled to more than 60 countries on five continents, enjoying a high reputation throughout the globe. 

The orchestra's repertoire includes over 2,000 pieces ranging from Baroque, classical, Romantic, folk, and modern music, demonstrating the richness and depth of Viennese music. With a rich repertoire, superb technique, perfect timbre, delicate performance, exquisite performance, and elegant demeanor, the orchestra has been dubbed "an all-round orchestra" by critics. 

Time: 7:30 p.m., Dec. 31; 7:30 p.m., Jan. 1, 2025

Venue: Opera Hall, Bay Opera of Shenzhen, Bao'an District

Metro: Line 5 to Baohua Station, Exit A