City museum’s East Branch to open

THE East Branch of Shanghai Museum will partly open to the public on February 2.

The trial opening of “Bronze Exhibition Hall” and “Star Over China,” occupying quarter of the total exhibition space will be unveiled first, with reservations limited to 8,000 people per day.

The project started in September 2017, aiming to form a cultural cluster effect with the Shanghai Science and Technology Museum, Shanghai Library East, Oriental Art

Center and other cultural facilities in the neighborhood.

Covering an area of about 46,000 square meters, with a total floor area of 113,200 square meters, the six-story building also includes two underground floors.

“It may take visitors three whole days to walk around all the exhibitions inside the East Branch of Shanghai Museum,” said Chu Xiaobo, director of Shanghai Museum.

The museum houses 20 exhibition halls and interactive experience spaces, including 13 permanent exhibitions of cultural relics, four interactive experience spaces and three special exhibition halls.

Each floor reserves a sitting area, shopping, and dining or coffee area to meet the diverse needs of visitors.

More than 80 percent of the exhibition, including “Shanghai Style Calligraphy and Painting” and “The Calligraphy of Zhao Puchu,” will be opened to the public by the end of June.

The much-adored exhibition hall of “Chinese calligraphy through the ages” and “Chinese paintings through the ages” will open at the end of November, marking the official implementation of the East Branch of Shanghai Museum.

In addition, the North Branch of Shanghai Museum, sited on the Yangpu riverfront, is still under construction.

It is not only targeted to become a world-class museum of ancient ships and archeology but also a global first-class underwater archeology research center.