Performing arts are key to achieving the goal of cementing Beijing's status as a global cultural hub, Cheng Yuezhu reports.

Performing arts projects show great potential for boosting the development of cultural industries, says An Ting, a member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference National Committee, the country's top political advisory body.

As the chairman of the board of performing arts company Beijing Chic-Pia International Culture Development, An has led his team in producing a number of theater works and promoting them to international audiences. "Over the years, my team and I have been dedicated to the cultural industries, promoting traditional Chinese culture to the world, with the goal of making Chinese culture better known worldwide."

In the past two decades, he has collaborated with renowned Chinese artists, such as dancer-choreographer Yang Liping. The representative productions, including Dynamic Yunnan and The Peacock, have toured more than 40 countries and regions, with a record of more than 6,000 performances in China alone.

As a member of the 13th and 14th CPPCC National Committee, An has submitted proposals for developing the cultural industries and promoting traditional Chinese culture. For this year's two sessions, he will submit a proposal for using major performing arts projects as momentum to build China into a global cultural hub.

In January, "building a capital of performing arts" was mentioned for the first time in Beijing's Government Work Report. According to the report, Beijing will work hard to promote a series of major productions, organize and create a number of artistic masterpieces, and host a cultural consumption season that benefits the people.

In correspondence to the governmental report, An says that Beijing has a strong market foundation and a leading edge in China's performing arts industry, in that it has the largest number of performing arts groups among China's major cities, and ranks highly in terms of both number of theaters and audience sizes.

"Government figures show that before 2020, excluding the movie box office, Beijing had around 24,000 commercial performances each year, nearly 70 performances a day. These performances have attracted more than 10 million audience members and generated over 1.7 billion yuan ($245 million) in revenue," he says.

"We should take advantage of the upcoming recovery in international exchanges, and offer favorable incentives and policies to attract high-quality cultural performances and movies from around the world to host their China premieres in Beijing in order to further expand the capital city's influence as a cultural hub."

An says that such events will not only provide an impetus to the cultural industries, but also help promote the development of the peripheral industries, boosting consumption with regard to the production's merchandise and the city's cultural landmarks.

An also advocates bringing performances out of the traditional theaters and opening up new creative venues, echoing the concept of "new performing arts spaces" put forth in 2019 by Shanghai Performance Trade Association.

Differentiating from large or medium-sized professional theaters, these spaces refer to public cultural venues located within urban areas suitable for hosting performances, to match the growing demand and increasingly innovative formats of productions.

He says that, although this practice has proved favorable in a few cities, national-level laws and regulations as well as industry standards are yet to be determined.

Furthermore, Chinese cities should offer support to performing arts organizations in using former industrial sites, old factories, shopping malls and office buildings, among others, as spaces for artistic creation and performances.

"Social forces should be introduced to build and operate these spaces, and companies operating these spaces should be encouraged to participate in artistic creation and invest in performing arts," he says.

It is also his opinion that the bigger the domestic cultural consumption market, the stronger the country's international competitiveness in the cultural industries, so China should enhance cultural content production, as well as its domestic market and talent resources, in order to take its productions to global audiences.

Drawing from his previous projects, he says that performances featuring traditional Chinese culture have demonstrated popularity among the overseas audiences, and ethnic culture is welcomed by the whole world.

"With our long-term hard work in artistic creation, meticulous choreography and innovative productions, which carry the voice of the times, the requirements of the people and the essence of our culture, the reach and appeal of our country and culture can be enhanced," An adds.