Central China's Yichang holds 2024 Qu Yuan's hometown Dragon Boat Culture Festival

The 2024 Qu Yuan's hometown Dragon Boat Culture Festival kicked off on June 7 in Zigui County of Yichang City in central China's Hubei Province.

At the opening ceremony of the event, the sacrificial ceremony in ancient time was for the first time demonstrated in the form of art. A grand original performance named "China in the Songs of Chu" was staged, depicting the scenarios in the songs with local scenery and virtual reality technology.

This edition's cultural festival features three major events, including the opening ceremony, a CCTV special program and the second Dragon Boat Festival cultural month. The city also held a series of activities during the traditional festival, such as a dragon boat race, folk performances and a China-chic fair, to boost the atmosphere of the festival among local people.

Yichang is the hometown of Qu Yuan, a great Chinese patriotic poet, who was also a minister of the State of Chu during the Warring States Period (475 B.C.-221 B.C.). The Dragon Boat Festival is originated to commemorate Qu Yuan on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month of the Chinese calendar.

In 2009, the custom of "Qu Yuan's hometown Dragon Boat Festival", as a part of China's Dragon Boat Festival, was inscribed on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.

In recent years, Yichang has engaged in the promotion of Qu Yuan culture by building a Qu Yuan cultural park, producing Qu Yuan-themed play and launching the compilation of the complete works of the Songs of Chu, making Qu Yuan culture an important window and a distinctive symbol to show the profound cultural heritage of the city.