Visitors flood Shanghai Museum on May 18, 2023, the International Museum Day. Photo: Chen Xia/GT)

Cultural relic restoration skills by professional experts and craftsmen - such as restoring ancient bronzes and ceramics and mounting ancient calligraphy and paintings - were shown to the public in Shanghai on Thursday, the International Museum Day, allowing local citizens to personally experience the process of restoring cultural relics on this special day.

The "new experience of intangible cultural heritage" interactive activity, held by Shanghai Museum on Thursday, invited 40 citizens to experience the museum's six main intangible cultural heritage programs, including bronze repair and reproduction techniques, ancient painting and calligraphy mounting and restoration techniques, and ancient furniture repair skills.

The bronze repair and reproduction techniques, for instance, consist of more than ten steps including cleaning, dismantling, rust removal, orthosis, splicing, matching, shaping, mold turning, engraving, casting, grinding and coloring. Every step is highly technical, according to Shanghai Museum.

At the event, six inheritors of intangible cultural heritage restoration skills explained to the citizens the repair processes, and demonstrated some key steps.

Shanghai Museum was flooded with visitors on Thursday. In the museum, the Global Times saw a group of university students from northwestern Qinghai Province pose with an exhibit - a mask from Southwest China's Xizang Autonomous Region.

"I haven't seen so many cultural relics in Qinghai," said a student nicknamed Zhuoma.

"Today in Shanghai Museum, I see many treasures that I've only seen on television and mobile phones," Zhuoma told the Global Times. "Seeing them in person, I was struck by just how wonderful it felt."