Hungarian artists begin 13-day architectural tour of Shanxi province

During the Dragon Boat Festival holiday, 23 artists and cultural workers from Hungary visited ancient structures across Shanxi province to create works of art that interpret Chinese architecture through the lens of Hungarian art techniques.

Danko Reka Tunde, representative of the Sino-European Foundation of Chinese Culture and Education, described art as a universal language that requires no translation, saying that it carries the emotions, thoughts, and values of every nation. "The Hungarian artists are not only creators but also explorers, observers, and cultural envoys," she said. "They will leave precious traces of civilizational dialogue and friendly exchanges in Shanxi."

The 13-day tour kicked off in Taiyuan, with participants visiting multiple cities to see the Jinci Temple, Nanchan Temple, Yingxian Wooden Pagoda, and Yungang Grottoes.

Shanxi is home to nearly 30,000 ancient architectural relics, including 518 wooden structures from the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) and earlier periods, accounting for more than 80 percent of the national total. Hungarian fine arts carry a distinctive blend of Chinese and European cultural elements, which creates fertile ground for cultural exchanges and mutual learning between the two regions.

Farkas Roland, a Hungarian artist, said that art is the most powerful language of human connection, capable of breaking down geographical and cultural barriers to enable dialogue between hearts and minds.

He said he cherishes the opportunity to experience Shanxi's ancient architectural culture up close and looks forward to interpreting the beauty of Oriental architecture via his paintings, while bringing Hungarian artistic traditions to the exchange.

China and Hungary enjoy a long-standing friendship. In 2024, the two countries established an all-weather comprehensive strategic partnership for the new era, opening broad prospects for in-depth people-to-people and cultural exchanges.

Fan Qinghua, executive vice-president of the Shanxi Provincial People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries, said that since Shanxi and Hungary's Szolnok county established a sister-province relationship in 2007, the two sides have maintained close exchanges and achieved fruitful results in culture, education, tourism, and other fields.

Fan expressed the hope that this event would serve as an opportunity to build a regular mechanism for artistic exchange between the two sides, injecting sustained momentum into China-Hungary friendship and China-Europe civilization dialogue.

Li Jialu contributed to this story.