38.Guangzhou Museum

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Guangzhou Museum

Sea Guard Tower

Located in the Yuexiu Park in Guangzhou City (Canton),  the Museum is a comprehensive history museum with local characteristics. Established in 1929, it is a place used for collection and exhibition of historical data and cultural relics of the city. It has two major exhibition areas – the Sea Guard Tower housing the historical relics and the Art Gallery showing many exquisite local craftworks.

Sea Guard Tower
The historical exhibition is housed in a five-story building named Sea Guard Tower (Zhenhailou), which dates back to 1380. Sea Guard Tower is 28 meters (92 feet) high and 31 meters (102 feet) wide. It has been destroyed and rebuilt five times and was changed from a wooden structure to reinforced concrete in 1928. The reddish-brown bricks and grey tiles made the building primitively simple and unique. At the front of the building, there is a pair of two-meter-high stone lions in red sandstone made in the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

The tower houses nearly a thousand pictures, data and other exhibits on history of the city's history. Those collections display the changes of culture, custom and city developments. Walking into it, you can see a geographical model and a diagram of the ancient Guangzhou city at the first floor. On the second floor, there are historical relics (4000 BC - 589 AD) and unearthed remains of the Neolithic Age. When you come to the third floor, you can look around the historical relics of Sui, Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties. The fourth floor mainly exhibits plentiful historical relics of the Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1911). Modern Chinese cultural relics since the Opium War (1840 - 1842) are displayed on the fifth floor. Besides, there are also special showrooms at the east side of the tower where all kinds of temporary or memorable special exhibitions are often held. At the west side, there is a barbette with cannon on it and 23 ancient stone tablets.

The Art Gallery
To the east of the Sea Guard Tower lies the Art Gallery. Zhongyuan Tower, the major building of the museum, was built in 1930 and imitated the architectural style of the Hall of Literary Glory in the Forbidden City in Beijing. There are two exhibition halls – one in front of the Zhongyuan Tower and the other to the east - housing steles representing masterpieces of Chinese calligraphy from the Jin Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty.

Cantonese Clock

Bronze Vessel

Glazed Kettle

Since the end of the Ming Dynasty, Guangzhou acted as an important port for foreign trade on the marineSilk Road. Many delicate local craftworks with features of south China became more and more popular among western countries. The Art Gallery exhibits some culture relics and handicrafts showing the Chinese and Western culture exchange at that time. On the ground floor exhibits the silk, textile and embroidery artwork, which are for long the favorites of westerners. The second floor shows porcelain and a large number of Chinese paintings of various dynasties in ancient Chinese history. The painted porcelain, lacquer work and ivory carvings are on the third floor. Apart from these precious collections, there is a Paleontology Exhibition Hall to the east of the Zhongyuan Tower, displaying the Paleozoic and Mesozoic fossils and the models of the life scenes of the ancestors of human beings in the remote past.

Besides the Sea Guard Tower and the Gallery, Guangzhou museum offers another two exhibition areas (Sanyuanli Revolution Memorial Hall and Site of Headquarters of Mar. 29 Uprising) for special interest in the city’s revolutionary history. There are also some other popular nearby spots which you can visit if you have extra time. White Cloud Mountain with great natural scenery is only 2.1 kilometers (about 1.3 miles) from the museum. About 4.9 kilometers (about 3 miles) away lies the South China Botanical Garden.

Admission Fee	CNY 10 Free Days in 2013:  Jan.16, Feb.20,  Mar.13,  Apr.17,  May18,  Jun.9,  Jul.17,  Aug.14,  Sep.18,  Oct.16,  Nov.13,  Dec.18
Opening Hours	Sea Guard Tower: 09:00 - 17:30 (stop entering at 17:00) Art Gallery: 9:00 - 11:30, 13:00 - 17:30 (Close on Mondays and legal holidays) Sanyuanli Revolution Memorial Hall: 9:00 – 12:00, 13:30 – 17:00 (Closed on Mondays and legal holidays) Site of Headquarters of Mar. 29 Uprising: 9:00 – 12:00, 13:30 – 17:00 (Close on Sundays, Mondays and legal holidays)
Guide Service	The museum offers English guide service at a price of CNY 60 for less than 30 persons (CNY 4 for every extra person).
Transportation	1. Take subway line 2, get off at Yuexiu Park Station and get out from Exit B2; or take buses nos. 24, 87, 103, 104, 108, 109, 110, 122, 182, 284 or 543, and get off at Yuexiu Park Station, and then enter the front gate of the park. Follow the guideboard to find the museum. 2. Take subway line 2, get off at Yuexiu Park Station and get out from Exit A; or take buses nos. 33, 203 or 211, and get off at the intersection of North Jiefang Road, and then walk 200 meters (656 yards) and enter the west gate of the park. 3. Take buses nos. 6, 10, 33, 36, 66, 184, 191, 219 or 544, get off at Little North Wreath Station and enter through the east gate of the park.  Guangzhou Bus / Subway Search

 Other museum in Guangzhou:  Guangdong Provincial Museum