Translated with AI
"Cultural and Natural Heritage Day" is celebrated this year on June 14. The theme for this year is "Unleashing New Vitality and New Shine in Cultural Relics."
Chinese President Xi Jinping has always paid great attention to the protection of cultural relics, repeatedly emphasizing the need to preserve them in the modern world. During an inspection tour of Henan Province in May 2025, he visited the Longmen Grottoes (Dragon Gate Caves), which UNESCO called “the pinnacle of Chinese stone carving art,” and reiterated the importance of preserving, transmitting and popularizing Chinese cultural treasures.
As of 2025, China has a total of 59 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, ranking second in the world after Italy. However, judging by the number of natural and natural-cultural heritage sites, the country is the world leader.
Revealing the new potential of cultural values, allowing them to shine in a new way
In the spring of 2025, a white, six-legged robot dog nimbly moved along a thousand-year-old wooden pagoda in Shanxi Province, which was leaning lower and lower every day. It was this mechanical “explorer,” equipped with an intelligent 3D visual system, that scanned every detail of the structure with millimeter precision – peeling paint, displacement of the tenon joint. In real time, it recorded even the smallest damage to the cultural monument.
The wooden Yingxian Pagoda in Shanxi Province was built during the Liao Dynasty in 1056 and is the tallest and oldest in the world. Years of exposure to wind and sun have caused it to lean northeast. Many parts of the pagoda are difficult for people to access, and a robot dog comes to the rescue, exploring them with its six "paws".
Zhan Changfa, former deputy director of the China Academy of Cultural Heritage, said the "digital guardian" contributes to the preventive conservation of the pagoda by using AI to process scientifically based data to protect it.
"The combination of advanced technology and ancient civilization opens up boundless possibilities for the transmission and inheritance of culture," said Zhang Changfa. According to the researcher, the era of "AI + archaeology" has already arrived. Accurately recognizing damage to monuments is only the first step. At present, AI can automatically generate restoration plans, forming a "digital protection system" for cultural monuments.
At the end of last year, the game "Black Myth: Wukong" exploded the world charts, Sun Wukong, its main character, became the "face" of the cultural heritage of Shanxi Province. In the game, a stunningly realistic world of ancient architecture is recreated using 3D scanning and AI reconstruction technologies. To achieve historical authenticity, the developers traveled all over the country and created the first digital library of virtual models of ancient buildings in China. And to successfully enter the cultural products on the global market, the game has a machine translation system that not only automatically translates texts, but also explains in detail the philosophical allusions embedded in the plot, making Eastern wisdom understandable to foreign players.
Following the game's release, the province launched the "Wukong Journey Through Shanxi" project, which attracted an unprecedented flow of tourists to the ancient building complex.
According to incomplete statistics, in less than 2 months after the launch of the project, 27 historical sites featured in the game received nearly 5.37 million visitors, revenue from ticket sales amounted to 166 million yuan (about 1.66 billion rubles), and the coverage of related topics on the Internet exceeded 10 billion views.
On March 1, 2025, the revised version of the “Law of the People’s Republic of China on the Protection of Cultural Heritage” came into effect, which for the first time legally enshrined provisions on the digital protection of cultural heritage. Cultural relics come to life in the digital world: in the Liangzhu Museum, using AR glasses, you can “project” such artifacts as a jade axe and a ring-shaped jasper regalia used for ceremonies or funeral rites into real space, allowing you to see the smallest patterns on black ceramics with ancient symbols. The Palace Museum, in turn, has digitized 920 thousand exhibits, created a 3D panorama of the Forbidden City with an area of 720 thousand square meters. Thanks to the VR project “Panoramic Palace”, visitors can even “transfer” to closed access areas…
Making intangible cultural heritage an integral part of modern life
According to statistics, China has 1,557 representative intangible cultural heritage sites of national importance. In December 2024, the Spring Festival and related social practices of the Chinese people were inscribed on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, bringing the total number of Chinese sites included in the UNESCO lists to 44, a new world record.
At the Intangible Cultural Heritage Festival held in June, supported by TikTok's Chinese version, Douyin, as part of the 9th Chengdu International Intangible Cultural Heritage Festival, embroidered slippers from the Yunnan-based company Dianyun attracted everyone's attention. Its founder, Zeng Yongguo, proudly said that the shoes, or as they are called, "Colorful Phoenix", are a bestseller. In the first five months of this year, 120,000 pairs have already been sold on the Douyin app.
“I am originally from Chongqing. Our family has been making fabric shoes for generations, and naturally, we have love and respect for this craft. My mother opened a shoe workshop. I watched her do everything since I was a child,” said Zeng Yongguo. In 2009, he started his own business, and then in 2012, he founded his brand “Dianyun”. The character “Dian” (滇) is an abbreviation for the name of Yunnan Province, and “Yun” (韵) embodies the elegance of traditional aesthetics. The brand skillfully combines intangible cultural heritage techniques such as Sichuan embroidery, one of the four famous styles of traditional Chinese embroidery, as well as embroidery of the Miao and Yi peoples, with fashionable elements popular among young people. At the same time, machine embroidery has been introduced to solve the problems of mass production.
In 2019, Zeng Yongguo saw an opportunity to expand his business through e-commerce when his brand's handcrafted products began to attract more attention on Douyin. At the time, the platform was rapidly gaining popularity. Zeng Yongguo decided to refocus on Douyin.
"Previously, our shoes were bought by tourists in an offline store. After we started filming and posting short videos on our Douyin page, which has a significant number of users in the country, more and more art lovers began to contact us. They liked, subscribed to the page, visited the online store and bought our products. Now the store regularly hosts live broadcasts. Videos and streams are the best way to popularize a particular craft," Zeng Yongguo added.
According to the Douyin Intangible Cultural Heritage Report, over the past 12 months, more than 200 million intangible cultural heritage videos have been published on the platform, with 749.9 billion views. The number of intangible cultural heritage followers under 30 who opened a Douyin page increased by 24% year-on-year. Online sales of intangible cultural heritage products have exceeded 6.5 billion units.
From exploring the origins of civilization in cultural relics to the living preservation of ancient cities and architecture, from traditional festivals to the innovative heritage of colorful intangible cultural assets, the path of strengthening cultural confidence and building a powerful cultural country. Under the guidance of Xi Jinping's cultural thought, modern China draws wisdom and strength from its 5,000-year history, creating new pages in building a socialist cultural country, and confidently moving toward the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
(Author: Tian Tian)
