Beijing Olympics Promote Lost Arts in China

Editor's note: Beijing is hush-hush about its much anticipated Olympics opening ceremony, but according to some American scholars who visited China recently, folk art will be prominently featured. They talked to NAM editor, Jun Wang, who monitors Chinese media.


SAN FRANCISCO – What will be presented at the Olympics opening ceremony has been kept under wraps in China, but U.S. scholars and students revealed that folk art will be performed in the most-looked-forward-to event ever in that country.

Blair Remington, a junior art major at the University of Central Florida (UCF) told New America Media that yo-yo and bow-and-arrow performances will be showcased at the Olympics opening ceremony. Peking opera masks will also be on display. "I'm looking forward to seeing them on TV," she said.

Remington, on her trip to China in May, learned this from artists who told her they would be performing. She went there last May with a student team from UCF and the University of Oregon (UO) to cover and do research on Chinese folk arts.

Christine Dellert from News and Information Services at UCF said students were sent to China for half a dozen trips in China Vine, a joint project by the two universities and their China partner, Shandong University of Art and Design, in the city of Jinan. Students there told her that folk artists will also be displaying their skills in the Beijing Olympic Village and media center, as well as at the opening ceremony. Besides the promise of fireworks, Beijing has not released information on what the opening ceremony will be like.