Cultural exchanges and artistic innovation key to common prosperity

Ti Gong

Artists from China and the United States stressed the importance of cultural exchanges and artistic innovation at a conference at Space 185 in the Shanghai Bund Art Center.

Peggy Blood, an artist professor at Savannah State University in the US, said renaissance arts through the Civil Rights Movement and elements from traditional Chinese culture had inspired her artistic innovations. She added that cultural exchanges can promote the common prosperity of Chinese and Western cultures.

Prof. Blood, who has been working in the field of higher education for more than 40 years, is a professional artist and has served as the director of the Confucius Institute at Savannah State University. She has been dedicated in promoting intercultural communication in the fields of art and education. Her works are being exhibited at the Shanghai Harmony Art Gallery.

Chinese artists Chen Biao and He Deming agreed with her ideas and stressed that it was crucial for China to enhance cultural exchanges and artistic innovation.

Ti Gong

The event was co-organized by the Shanghai Bund Art Center and Shanghai East Reading Club to celebrate the Mid-Autumn Festival.

The center is a comprehensive platform being developed by Shanghai International Commodity Auction Co to integrate functions including art data center, index release, exhibition, appreciation, academic exchanges, auction and salons. It aims to become a "name card" of Shanghai as an international cultural metropolis.

Space 185, in a 120-year-old building at 185 Sichuan Road M., 400 meters from the historic Bund waterfront, is the first contemporary art space open to the public of the under-construction Bund Art Center. The space will offer top artists important exhibitions and related activities with academic and market influence in the future.