What's on

Etched into history

The Museum of Wu, in Suzhou, Jiangsu province, has mounted an exhibition celebrating the city's long tradition in stele engraving, where the fine technique involved renders dignity and grace to the carved characters and texts, as well as the rubbings made thereafter.

A booming economic and cultural center since ancient times, Suzhou encouraged the practice of transposing the great works of intellectuals and artists onto stelae (usually slabs or pillars) and other stone surfaces, so that they would survive the ravages of time for people in the future to appreciate.

The current stele carving craft exhibition is the sixth in a series of that the Museum of Wu launched to introduce time-honored crafts and arts originating in Suzhou. Categories of stone engraving at the exhibition include those on rocks and cliffs, on gravestones, government announcements and on stelae on display at ancestral temples, among others.

Suzhou has long been known for its quality stone, quarried from Taihu Lake, and the skill of its artisans. The show also displays rubbings of the stones to highlight the importance of this unique form of art in documenting history and preserving the essence of Chinese culture. The exhibition runs until May 5.

9 am-5 pm, closed on Mondays. 9 Tantai Jie, Wuzhong district, Suzhou, Jiangsu province. 0512-6565-5999.

Rite where it belongs

The Evolution of Rites in the East, a grand exhibition to trace the history and cultures originating in Shandong province, sparked good reviews when it was held at the Tsinghua University Art Museum from October to early this year. It has now returned home, where it will be on display at the Shandong Museum in the provincial capital of Jinan. The exhibition brings together more than 400 artifacts from the collections of different cultural venues in the province, providing a panoramic view of the ancient cultures that thrived in the province and were integrated into wider Chinese civilization.

Several items on show are classified as culturally significant.

These include a red, animal-shaped pottery kettle belonging to the Neolithic Dawenkou Culture, a bronze ax-blade from the Shang Dynasty (c.16th century-11th century BC), the hollow carvings of which form the face of an impressive beast, and a Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) crown — or nine-string mian — which was excavated from the tomb of Zhu Tan, with the title of Prince of Lu.

9 am-5 pm, closed on Mondays.11899 Jingshi Lu, Jinan, Shandong province. 0531-8505-8201.

Wild imagination

Swiss artist Rebekka Steiger's exhibition now on at Tank Shanghai art center shows the influence of living in both the East and the West. A wild imagination, grounded in the experiences of traveling the world and different cultural perspectives, is evident. Her works blend the techniques of freedom and fluidity she learned from Chinese painting, while taking part in a residency program in the country years ago, to depict the relationship between nature and people, as well as the use of calligraphy brushwork to depict subjects in paintings.

The title of the exhibition is taken from one of the paintings on show, Octopus Mountain, and is derived from her experiences of traveling in Guilin, Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region, during which she found many mountains named because of their passing appearance to animals. It points to the angle of comparing Eastern and Western cultures in her work, which keeps widening her vision and enriching her mind. The exhibition runs through to June 2.

12 am-6 pm, Tuesdays to Fridays, 10 am-6 pm on Saturdays and Sundays. 2380 Longteng Avenue, Xuhui district, Shanghai. 021-6950-0005.