China Focus: Digital technologies empower cultural heritage preservation, inheritance

HANGZHOU, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- One moment you are walking alone through a wintry landscape, your footsteps etching the snow, and the next, the frost softens into a gentle stream lined with daffodils that stir to your touch as fireflies rise in a shimmering dance.

This was no dream, but an interactive art installation inspired by motifs from 40 ancient Chinese paintings, offering visitors an immersive encounter with the beauty of traditional art through digital innovation.

The installation was showcased at the Light of Internet Expo, a sideline exhibition of the three-day 2025 World Internet Conference (WIC) Wuzhen Summit, which concluded on Sunday in the ancient water town of Wuzhen in east China's Zhejiang Province.

The installation is a digital project of the "A Comprehensive Collection of Ancient Chinese Paintings" program by Zhejiang University and the Zhejiang provincial cultural heritage administration. The program has so far compiled and published more than 12,000 Chinese paintings from over 260 cultural institutions worldwide.

"It's such a refreshing experience to see elements from famous ancient paintings unfolding before me and to interact with them," said a visitor surnamed Ji, who launched a virtual sky lantern on the interactive wall with a simple touch.

According to Sun Xiaojun, deputy head of the program's editorial board, the installation integrates holographic projection, spatial audio processing, and real-time multi-sensory interaction technologies to bring classical art to life in an interactive format.

Sun said that the program aims to ensure that ancient Chinese paintings are not merely archived as relics, but are empowered by digital technologies to spark public interest and reach wider audiences. Since 2022, the program has showcased its digital outcomes both at home and abroad.

The role of digital technologies in revolutionizing cultural heritage preservation and inheritance featured prominently at this year's WIC Wuzhen Summit. Discussions highlighted how AI, virtual reality (VR), and other digital tools are breathing new life into ancient treasures.

At the expo, a VR project transported visitors back to Hangzhou during the Song Dynasty (960-1279), allowing them to explore the architectural beauty of the city's wooden structures. Another mixed reality (MR) experience took participants over 200 years into the past to witness the compilation of Siku Quanshu (The Complete Library of the Four Treasuries), one of the most comprehensive book collections in Chinese history.

To further promote such innovations, the WIC on Friday launched a specialized committee on cultural heritage digitization, aimed at enhancing capacity-building and promoting global exchanges and cooperation in the field.

Ren Xianliang, secretary-general of the WIC, said that the committee's establishment "comes at a pivotal moment amid the global wave of digitization," adding that technologies such as AI have provided powerful tools to advance the protection, inheritance and utilization of cultural heritage.

On Sunday, delegates of the summit also attended a sub-forum on cultural heritage digitization, where they shared best practices for better preservation and explored future areas of cooperation.

Ding Pengbo, deputy director of the National Museum of China, noted that despite recent progress, challenges remain, including insufficient data coverage and quality, as well as the limited use of AI and other cutting-edge technologies in cultural heritage preservation, due to high costs and implementation difficulties.

She called for accelerated efforts to build high-quality digital databases of cultural heritage and for strengthened global collaboration through platforms like the WIC to foster an open, inclusive and sustainable ecosystem for cultural heritage digitization. ■