The National Art Museum of China (NAMOC) held an opening ceremony Wednesday afternoon to launch a major Spring Festival exhibition of art works donated over the past five decades.

The National Art Museum of China (NAMOC) holds an opening ceremony on January 26, 2011, to launch a major Spring Festival exhibition of art works donated over the past five decades. [China.org.cn]

The exhibition will feature more than 800 works by 89 artists, covering a wide range of genres, including traditional Chinese painting, oil painting, prints, sculpture, sketches, cartoons and folk art. It will run for a month from January 27th to February 26th, with free entry from February 3rd to 8th - the main period of the Spring Festival.

Speaking at the launch, NAMOC Deputy Director Liang Jiang said the exhibition would be "comprehensive and attractive. As an overall representation of NAMOC's donated masterpieces for the first time, it covers the classics donated to the museum since 1961 when the museum was built."

Liang said the museum had over 110,000 masterpieces in its collection, of which about 10,000 were donated, some by the artists themselves or their family members, and others from collectors and scholars.

Most of the donated pieces are modern works, including works by well known contemporary artists, award-winning works from major exhibitions, and contemporary folk art. But there are also older pieces, including many works from late Ming Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty. Probably the most valuable donated masterpiece is Su Shi's scroll painting Xiaoxiang Bamboo and Stone, which dates back over 1000 years to the Northern Song Dynasty.

NAMOC Director Fan Di'an said the exhibition would be a great opportunity for the public to appreciate the nation's cultural heritage.

NAMOC is a national museum dedicated to the collection, research and exhibition of modern and contemporary artistic works. The building covers an area of more than 18,000 square meters and houses 17 exhibition halls. It was one of the top 10 architectural projects launched in Beijing in the 1950s and opened its doors for the first time in 1961.