Silk Road Week 2020 - June 19-24

The idea for "Silk Road Week" was firstly raised on June 21, 2019, when the International Association for the Study of Silk Road Textiles (IASSRT) and the Chinese Museums Association’s Committee of Museums along the Silk Road jointly proposed the “Hangzhou Initiative for Dissemination and Promotion of the Silk Road Spirit”, which aimed to better tap and recognize the contents and value of the Silk Road, and to strengthen the protection of the Silk Road sites and relics.

The plan for the "Silk Road Week" is that within the week around June 22 each year, museums and other institutions organize activities, including exhibitions, performances, reports, seminars etc, to mark and celebrate the anniversary of the Silk Road - from Chang’an to the Tianshan Corridor - becoming a World Heritage location on the UNESCO list on June 22, 2014.

Home activity

The National Silk Museum will lead the home activity of the first Silk Road Week from June 19 to June 24, 2020 in Hangzhou, on the theme of "The Silk Roads: Mutual Learning for Future Collaboration", including the following events :

＊ The "Annual Report of Silk Road Cultural Heritage 2019" - this will give a summary and chronicle of events of 2019, including Silk Road exhibitions, archaeological discoveries, cultural events and academic achievements.

＊ A themed exhibition titled "The Silk Road: before and after Richthofen", which will introduce to the public from a new perspective in terms of historical communications between East and West, the seven trips of Ferdinand von Richthofen in China, the five expeditions of UNESCO to the Silk Road, and the process by which the Silk Road was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

＊ An exhibition titled "Stories of the Silk Road Treasures" participated by twenty museums along the Silk Road, each presenting one object and telling a fascinating story behind.

＊ The official launch of the "World Map of Silk Project" : led by Chinese scholars, the Project plans to organize more than 12 international cultural institutions, universities, and museums to focus on the integral organization and implementation of resource surveys, technology research and development, demonstration and applications of the world silk heritage.

＊ An International Seminar of the Silk Road which will offer an excellent opportunity for curators from all over the world who have previously curated exhibitions on topics related to the Silk Road to communicate and exchange ideas.

Associated Activity

In the meantime, we are expecting museums, institutions and companies along the Silk Road to devise and organize associated activities in the spirit of the "Silk Road Week". As the global organizer, the National Silk Museum will keep track of these activities and present information about them to the public, so as to make the Silk Road Week an international festival and thus promote thoroughly the Silk Road Spirit.

For more information, see http://www.silkroadweek.com/en