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On March 6, 2019, the Chinese Culture and Literature Hall is hosting a book exhibit with the theme "Beijing Opera".                          

pekin

Peking opera is one of the most famous forms of traditional Chinese opera both in China and in the world. It emerged at the end of the eighteenth century and was fully developed by the middle of the nineteenth century.  It is the largest genre of opera in China and ranks first in terms of abundance of repertoire, number of actors, companies and audiences. 

Contemporary Chinese opera is almost entirely in keeping with the traditional Chinese performance. Of the thousands of operas that have survived from past centuries, 200 are still active on the stage. Chinese opera is one way to experience China's multifaceted culture, as each of the Chinese arts contains a piece of the people's national identity.

On November 16, 2010, China's Peking Opera was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Intangible Site.  Peking opera combines the integrated use of "hand, eye, body, rules and gait" and reflects the aesthetic theatrical ideal in traditional Chinese society. It is rightly considered "the true art of the state.  Its main difference from the forms of European opera to which we are accustomed is that the action on stage is not constrained by time or space. To reflect all these changes, the actors make extensive use of symbolism: for example, special hand movements depict crossing a river, and an actor with a lash walking in circles around the stage shows a horse race. Since it is quite complicated and requires not only the actors' acting skills, but also many other skills and constant training, several decades ago there were special schools, which mostly recruited orphans, who from childhood learned to embody all the traditions of Chinese opera on stage. Chinese musical theater or opera is an elaborate production that simultaneously involves musical instruments, elaborate traditional costumes, and actors must sing, dialogue, dance, acrobatics, and martial arts exercises.

The book exhibition from the collection of the National Library of Kazakhstan presents books on the art of opera in China in Russian, English and Chinese.