With a double identity as the cultural and economic hub of South China, the City of Guangzhou is one of the first cities listed as Historical Towns with Renown Culture in China owing to its unique Lingnan culture of more than 2200 years. In recent years, there is an increasing attention to the city's culture identity along with its economic bloom. The city witnesses a face lift-up in the culture field as the municipal government vows to establish a modern city culture in preservation of the town's highly respected culture convention.

Preservation and utilization of cultural resources with historic importance
Guangzhou possesses rich culture resources with a history, including 219 sites of culture relics, 26 museums with a total collection of 90,000 pieces, 16 preservation zones and 21 zones of restricted access for relics protection and 27 "Old Firms with Fame" etc. Over the past decade, preservation and utilization of those cultural resources have been increasingly valued in the government agenda together with its economic growth and city construction. As a result, a large number of historical and cultural relics are in well preservation, for example, Residency of Nanyue Kingdom in West Han Dynasty, Sluice of Han Dynasty, Liumai Dyke of Song Dynasty, Site of the San Die City, Remains of the villages in Song Dynasty, Historical Site of Pre-Qin Culture in Nansha and Remains of the ancient path dated 1000 years ago in downtown.

In 2003, archaeological discoveries in the constructing site of the City's University Town have brought to light many relic sites of great importance in the nation’s archaeological anthology such as Tombs of Emperors in South Han Dynasty (De Tomb and Kang Tomb), Tombs with Stone Statues of Man and Horse in Ming Dynasty and Fort of Early Qing Dynasty. In the Fourth Survey on Cultural Relics conducted by the local authority from the second half of 2003 to July 2004, 3016 more have been listed as valuable clues for further archaeological findings. On the other hand, museums of regional and national importance like Tomb Museum of Nanyue King in Western Han Dynasty, Guangzhou Art Museum, Memorial Hall of Dr.Sun Yat-sen's Official Residency, Guangzhou Museum of Finance and Currency, Guangzhou Post Museum and Chen Liji Museum of Chinese Medicine have been open to public. Renovation to historic sites such as Huangpu Military Academy, Nanhai Temple of Huangpu Old Harbor and relics of ancient villages are in process, and the construction of memorial halls for historic events such as the Communist Party's Third National Congress and the 1911 revolution for democracy in the contemporary history of China is also being prepared. In joint cooperation with the tourism industry in Guangzhou, the local authority has designed 4 tour routes to culture relics along the Pearl River and to historic sites related to Dr. Sun Yat-sen. In addition, within the national scope, Guangzhou takes the first step towards free access to museums and memorials. One Open Day a month and discounts to children and groups of disadvantage are warmly welcomed by visitors and local communities. To better preserve and rationally utilize Relics of Nanyue Kingdom and Cantonese Opera, both have been submitted for being listed in UNESCO's "World Cultural Heritage" and "World Verbal and non Substantial Cultural Heritage" respectively.

Creations in the New Age Momentum
The 8 professional performing arts organizations in Guangzhou cover a wide range of art forms from Cantonese Opera, Folk Music, Ballet, Dance, Drama, Puppet Show to Acrobatics, not to mention hundreds of arts companies set up by local amateurs. Thanks to the shared pursuit for "Perfection in Production", venues in Guangzhou are never short of creations of excellence. Since 2002, productions like "Flower and Moon Shadows" (Cantonese Opera), "Chu River and Han Border" (Cantonese Opera), "Mei Lanfang" (Ballet), "Turando" (Ballet) and "Don Quixote" (Ballet), On the way of Escortion (drama), Baimen Willow (drama), Anecdotes of Guangzhou (Musical), Legend of the Five Rams (Musicals) have been warmly received and frequently awarded at home and abroad. Take the creations of Guangzhou Corps de Ballet as a example to the point. The awards and professional recognitions from 2004 Wagner International Ballet Contest, Shanghai International Ballet Contest and the National Lotus Prize for Dance are great proof of creativity of performing arts in Guangzhou. Meanwhile, creations of arts amateurs in Guangzhou are not to be ignored as their evergrowing accomplishment have led them to great success in national competitions and festivals. One may find the amateur or community art promising as one notices that Women in Xiguan, a drama production of amateurs was awarded "Cao Yu Prize", the Chinese Noble of drama and that in July 2004, these arts groups gained 9 gold medals and 4 silver medals at the 6th Children's Art Festival of Guangdong and the 3rd Asian Fesitval of Children's Folk Arts.

Dynamic Life in the Culture Stage
Over the past few years, large-scale art events staged in Guangzhou has not only provided the local communities with a rich culture life but also established the city as one with renown culture events and festivals.

In the latter half of the year 2004, Guangzhou will hold "Gold Bell Award" of the Fourth Chinese Music, Ram City International Canton Drama Festival, "Gold Lion Award" of the Sixth National Acrobatics Contest, Guangzhou International Arts Exposition, Fresco Exposition (Guangzhou Exposition Area) of the Tenth National Fine Artistic Works Exposition and the National College Students’ Drama Festival, all of which will start a new upsurge of cultural activities. Besides, such activities for all year around will to a great extent meet the cultural needs of all masses, flourish culture and arts and improve the artistic influence of Guangzhou as "the Night of Guangzhou" Artistic Performance, holiday activities during the Gold Week of May Day, National Day and Spring Festival, Square Artistic Performance of Metropolitan Hot Waves", the summer vocation juvenile literary and artistic activities of "the Summer of Ram City", the activities at International Museum Day, the New Singer Medal Contest of Ram City, Guangdong Provincial Culture and Entertainment Joint Performances.

A Cultural industry In Formation
Guangzhou, as one of the earliest areas developing cultural industry, possesses advantages of developing cultural industry. It sticks to the guideline of "one hand grasping prosperity and the other management", promoting the growth of cultural industry and the step-by-step standardization of cultural market order. Eventually, the industries of performance, cultural entertainment and cinema shows grow very fast. At present, the professional artistic organizations as well as other performance groups put 2000 and 1000 performances on the stage. The cultural and entertaining sites of all sorts are scattered along the city, including 9 movies issuing organizations, 113 cinema units showing more than 40,000 movies annually. Zhonghua Square Cinema was approved as one of the first six national five-star cinemas. Guangzhou Performance Corp signed a contract on setting up Jinyi Audio-visual Investment Co. Ltd, Guangzhou with Warner Bros, planning to establish more than 10 modern cinemas. The flourish at cultural market has brought forth the rise of cultural consumption and promoted the growth of Guangzhou cultural industry.

The continuously completed cultural facilities
The symbolic cultural facilities include Xinghai Odeum, Guangdong Art Gallery, Sun Yet-san Memorial Hall, Guangzhou Arts Museum, and Hongxiannu Art Center. There are still 14 public libraries, 44 artistic performance sites, 300 cinema showing sites in Guangzhou. Meanwhile, we have set up a 4-level cultural network at the level of city, district, street and community and completed continuously or built cultural stations, reading rooms and cultural squares. In the coming years, a group of full-functional, well-equipped cultural facilities like Guangzhou opera house, Guangdong Provincial Museum, Guangzhou Library, Guangzhou Newspaper Industrial Cultural Square will be completed. The construction of cultural facilities not only turns spotlight on Guangzhou urban views but also provides Guangzhou residents and visiting tourists with good sites for appreciating culture.

The increasingly growing cultural exchange with foreign countries
Since its opening, Guangzhou has expanded its cultural exchange and communication with foreign countries all through the world, especially the more and more frequent communications with Hong Kong because of the neighboring advantages. In recent years, Guangzhou has enhanced the cultural cooperation and communication with Hong Kong in many ways. For example, "5.18 International Museum Day" was successfully held jointly in Guangzhou, Hong Kong and Macao in 2004. With the expansion of opening to the foreign world, the cultural cooperation and communication between Guangzhou and Hong Kong will have a wider and brighter foreground.

A city's strength depends on its culture
The competitiveness of a city is ultimately based on its culture. Therefore, Guangzhou has decided that cultural construction is the key project in the coming 20 years. In the new era, Guangzhou will concentrate its cultural activities on the general aim of realizing modernization and constructing a modernized metropolitan in order to construct it into a powerful and well-known cultural city adaptive to the modernized metropolitan by way of fully deepening the connotation of "Guangzhou as the cradle of Chinese Ancient Maritime Silk Road, the center of Lingnan Culture, the source of modern revolutionary history and the pioneer of contemporary reforms and opening".