Chinese porcelains show charms of Chinese culture at Canton Fair

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Exquisite Chinese porcelains are on public display at the ongoing 136th session of the China Import and Export Fair, commonly known as the Canton Fair, offering a glimpse into the charms of Chinese culture.

The 136th Canton Fair is running in three phases from Oct 15 to Nov 4 in Guangzhou City of south China's Guangdong Province.

At an area covering 54,400 square meters, a wealth of general ceramics and decorative art ceramics of different shapes and sizes by Chinese manufacturers are winning over visitors with their unique designs.

Designers have made a good blend of traditional craft and fashionable aesthetics to create works that modern-day consumers may accept and appreciate more readily. 

Zhan Peiming, an exhibitor, said the design of a tea set was inspired by the Yungang Grottoes, a UNESCO World Heritage site featuring over 50,000 stone Buddhist sculptures in north China's Datong City.   "We inherit the ancient culture from within, further develop and expand it by combining various geometric elements to create a harmonious blend of squares and circles, thereby passing on our Chinese culture. There are also many new amazing stuffs," Zhan explained.

Attracted by these delicate products, many overseas buyers are planning to make bulk purchases.

"It's so much beautiful the pieces and how it is made. It's something new for me. They are wonderful pieces. So beautiful. I believe in Brazil, we have a market for these," said a Brazilian buyer.   Launched in 1957, the Canton Fair is held in the spring and autumn seasons each year. The exhibition is widely seen as a barometer of China's trade.

Chinese porcelains show charms of Chinese culture at Canton Fair

China's Shenzhou-23 crewed spaceship blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the country's northwest on Sunday, sending three astronauts to its orbiting space station.

The spaceship, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, lifted off from the launch site at 23:08 Beijing Time (15:08 GMT).

The crew members consist of mission commander Zhu Yangzhu, and fellow astronauts Zhang Zhiyuan and Lai Ka-ying, who is also the first astronaut from China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

In another notable first, one of the crew members is set to undertake a year-long stay aboard the space station, double the usual duration of previous Shenzhou missions.

After entering orbit, the Shenzhou-23 spaceship will perform a fast automated rendezvous and docking with the radial port of the space station core module Tianhe, forming a combination of three modules and three spacecraft.

Shenzhou-23 marks the 40th flight of China's manned spaceflight program and the seventh manned flight mission since the Tiangong space station entered its application and development phase in late 2022.

China launches Shenzhou-23 manned spaceship