Night at the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC) event on January 4, 2023 in Beijing Photo: Xu Liuliu/GT

Germany and China will have another 50 years of friendly, close relations, German Ambassador to China Patricia Flor said on Wednesday while attending Night at the National Art Museum of China (NAMOC), an event held at China's national museum marking the close cultural exchanges between the two countries in recent years. 

A series of cultural events have taken place over the past year in both Beijing and Berlin to mark 2022's 50th anniversary of the bilateral relationship between the two countries, said the ambassador, who said it was her first visit to NAMOC after she took her position in July 2022. 

With the help of GEKA, a Germany-China cultural exchange foundation, the concert A Love Storm was held in Berlin to mark the two nations' friendship in October 2022. Three months later, the concert "traveled thousands of miles to Beijing to commemorate the friendship," said GEKA President Zhang Yu.  

In September, the German ambassador attended the opening of an exhibition featuring donated works by German Peter Ludwig and his wife Irene hosted by NAMOC. 

She noted at the event that direct people-to-people exchanges are crucially important and that she was looking forward to more opportunities in 2023. 

The Wednesday event included guided tours at the museum in addition to the concert, which included Western classic al music by Mozart and Liszt and the Chinese folk song "Jasmin Flower," staged by musicians Liu Fanglei, Ye Lin and Fan Ni, who have either studied or worked in Germany.