The National Palace Museum was the last stop of our official visits.  The Museum is not only a prime tourist attraction, but also the symbol of China's national treasures.  It houses a huge collection of painting, calligraphy, bronze, ceramics, jades, tapestry and embroidery, etc.  These treasures represent the highest aesthetic and artistic achievement of the Chinese civilization.  Apart from storing and displaying these national treasures, the Museum is also actively engaged in publishing and organizing conferences and seminars to promote Chinese art and culture.

The National Palace Museum Library is situated in a building next to the Museum Hall.  The Library holds a large collection of rare books and the archives of the Qing government.  The 400,000-item collection includes the Qing palace memorials, archives of the Grand Secretariat, Council of State and many other valuable research materials.  Also included are some woodblock impressions dated back to the Song Dynasty.  An exhibition of the history of publishing and printing in China is on permanent display in the Library Hall.

In this trip, we were impressed by the fact that many research libraries in Taiwan are open to the public.  The National Palace Museum Library does the same.  It serves the needs of the general public as well as scholars in the study of Chinese art and culture.  At the same time, researcher will find the collections particularly important for the research of modern Chinese history.  The quiet and comfortable environment offers a very congenial condition for research and study purposes.

We also saw the trend of convergence among libraries, museums and art centres in Taiwan.  Many institutions are working on digitization projects of their rare books and special collections and making their virtual collections available on the Internet.  By the way, the NPM Library is in the process of digitizing 190,000 items of the Qing Council of State and has finished about 80%.  Mr. Woo, Librarian of the NPM Library told us that the Library would be interested in cooperative projects with local and overseas library institutions.

We felt privileged that the Museum assigned a staff member to guide us throughout the day.  After the Library visit, we were brought to the important exhibits in the exhibition halls.  Due to time limitation, we could only cover a very small part of the valuable collections.  Our guide was a young art graduate.  She picked the best items on display and tried her best to explain to a group of non-specialists.  Her introduction was concise but clear.  Not only did we go through the best objects of Chinese art in less than 2 hours, but we also gained a basic training in art appreciation.
 

Reported by Tommy Yeung
President