2024 Los Angeles Lantern Art Expo Kicks off at Santa Anita Park
UNE News
On October 17, the 2024 Los Angeles Chang’an Lantern Festival (Los Angeles Lantern Art Expo) held a grand lighting ceremony at Santa Anita Park in Los Angeles. Many Chinese and American guests came to congratulate and praised the lantern festival for adding a bridge to promote Sino-US tourism and cultural exchanges.
Guo Shaochun, Consul General of China in Los Angeles, accompanied by his wife, Counselor Wang Wei, Cultural Counselor Wang Taiyu, US Congresswoman Judy Chu, Assembly member Mike Fong of the 49th District of California, Secretary of the CPC Party Working Committee of Xi’an Qujiang New District Wang Qinghua and many other Chinese and American officials and representatives of the Los Angeles overseas Chinese community attended the lighting ceremony that night. The Los Angeles Chang’an Lantern Festival is also a literary and artistic expo commemorating the 45th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the United States.
In his speech, Guo Shaochun said that :”Last year, the leaders of our two countries met in San Francisco and reached a series of important consensus, one of which was to promote people-to-people exchanges and tourism cooperation. Earlier this year, the 14th China-US Tourism Leadership Summit was successfully held in Xi’an, a city with over a thousand years of history. The meeting led to several important achievements, including Xi’an and Los Angeles becoming tourism partner cities. The two cities signed a strategic cooperation agreement to bring the Chinese lantern art to Los Angeles. Today, as we light up the lanterns here, we once again highlight the tremendous potential and continued efforts of China and the U.S. to foster cultural and tourism exchanges.”
Guo Shaochun praised that it was the P.S. Global Group that brought the beautiful Chinese lanterns to Los Angeles tonight, allowing local people to experience the colorful Chinese culture at their doorstep. This is a positive move to promote cultural exchanges between China and the United States and the multicultural society of the local society.
Congresswoman Judy Chu said in her speech at the lighting ceremony that this lantern festival will make the Los Angeles community more colorful. She said that such cultural exchanges not only enhance the friendship between the Chinese and American people, but also provide us with an excellent opportunity to experience Chinese traditional culture. For this reason, she expressed her heartfelt gratitude to the organizers for bringing such a splendid and magnificent Chinese traditional lighting culture to Los Angeles.
Wang Qinghua, secretary of the Party Working Committee of Xi’an Qujiang New District, who was invited to attend the lighting ceremony that night, said in his speech that the Chang’an Lantern Festival, which has a long history, plays an important role in promoting Chinese culture and promoting Sino-US friendly relations. She said that in May this year, Chinese President Xi Jinping emphasized the importance of tourism in promoting exchanges between the two peoples at the China-US Tourism High-level Dialogue, and the Chang’an Lantern Festival in Los Angeles is an important platform for promoting exchanges between the Chinese and American people.
In his speech, Representative Mike Fong of the 49th District of California expressed his heartfelt gratitude to the organizers for bringing Chinese lanterns to the district on behalf of the people in the district.
Carrissa Ip, the organizer of the Los Angeles Chang’an Lantern Festival, introduced the Los Angeles Chang’an Lantern Festival in Chinese, English and Spanish. The lantern festival is divided into three theme exhibition areas: Ancient Tang Dynasty, Prehistoric Dinosaur Park and Technology Future, which are suitable for audiences of different ages to watch at the same time. The Los Angeles Chang’an Lantern Festival was carefully made by Zigong, Sichuan, the hometown of Chinese lanterns, and transported to the United States for construction. In addition to the lanterns, the festival also has 240 stalls selling all kinds of food, snacks, and handicrafts, and provides Hanfu photography services. The organizers also used the world’s only brown giant panda “Qizi” plush toy as the mascot of the Chang’an Lantern Festival.
At the lighting ceremony, local artists in Los Angeles also performed traditional Chinese dragon and lion dances, which won applause from the audience.
