NCPA to celebrate 12th birthday with free shows, events

The National Center for the Performing Arts will celebrate its 12th birthday on Dec 22 with free shows and public activities projected to attract about 8,000 audiences.

Stage productions will be screened at the opera house of NCPA, including the premiere of a Chinese dance drama, Road to Tibet, which, performed and produced by NCPA in 2018, pays tribute to the landmark project of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the world's highest and longest line on a single plateau.

Exhibitions will be held at the venue, including a cultural relics exhibition on traditional Chinese folk musical instruments from Anhui province, and a painting exhibition by students, who attended NCPA's weekly public events. NCPA Chorus will organize flash mobs at public spaces of NCPA during the day.

According to Zhao Jiachen, vice-president of the NCPA, the venue has welcomed over 800 art troupes and over 300,000 artists from around the world. During the past 12 years, NCPA has produced 91 stage productions, including 31 original ones.

From Dec 20 to 23, NCPA's original opera production, The Long March, will be staged for the ninth round. It premiered in July 2016 to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Red Army's epic military retreat across the country over the course of two years, starting in 1934, to evade Kuomintang forces.

Marking the 180th anniversary of the First Opium War, a play named after the historical figure, Lin Zexu, a Chinese scholar and Qing Dynasty official, who was sent by the emperor to Guangzhou, Guangdong province, to stop the illegal import of opium from the British in 1838, premiered at the NCPA on Dec 14 and will be staged through Dec 22. The original play, starring veteran Chinese actors, including Pu Cunxin and Xu Fan, was commissioned by the NCPA and Guangzhou Dramatic Arts Centre.