Yu Garden Delegation to Join Dunedin Chinese Garden Celebrations

Dunedin (Wednesday, 11 September 2013) – An official party from Shanghai will join the fifth birthday celebrations for the Dunedin Chinese Garden this weekend.

The six-member delegation is representing Shanghai’s Yu Garden, which is the sister garden of the Dunedin Chinese Garden. The delegation will be led by Yu Garden Director of Management, Mr Zang Ling, who will be accompanied by four Garden staff and the Deputy Director General of the Huang Pu District Bureau of Cultural Affairs, Mr Liu Xiao Ming. Huang Pu is the district of Shanghai where Yu Garden is located.

Dunedin Shanghai Association and Dunedin Chinese Gardens Trust Chairman Malcolm Wong says the visit is a wonderful opportunity to showcase the Garden and Dunedin and build on existing cultural ties between the two cities. “Having the Yu Garden delegation here will make the Dunedin Chinese Garden fifth birthday celebrations all the more special.”

Highlights for the delegation will include the official opening of a photographic exhibition from Yu Garden and the launch of a book celebrating the origins, design and construction of the Dunedin Chinese Garden.

These Sunday events are invitation-only, but the exhibition of photographs from Yu Garden will be displayed in the NZR Lounge in the southern end of Toitū Otago Settlers Museum from 14 to 28 September. This exhibition reciprocates a photographic exhibition from the Dunedin Chinese Garden which was officially opened during the Dunedin Shanghai sister city delegation visit in April this year.

The book, Lan Yuan: A Garden of Distant Longing, tells the story of the world’s southernmost Chinese garden. The book is dedicated to the memory of Otago’s first generation of Cantonese settlers and their descendants. Lan Yuan is the Chinese name for the Dunedin Chinese Garden.

The 112-page book was written by James Beattie and Duncan Campbell, with poems by Sue Wootton and photography by Wynston Cooper. The book celebrates a garden which was conceptualised in Dunedin, designed and built in Shanghai and shipped 13,000km to Dunedin.

Mr Wong says producing the book was a major project which had been five years in the making. “It is both a scholarly record and a charming account of the realisation of a new attraction for the city.”

As well as the delegation, guests at the book launch will include the Vice Consul-General of the People’s Republic of China, Madam Chu Yanli, from the Christchurch Consulate.

ENDS

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