The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: The Forbidden City and the World — Cultural Encounters

EVENT DESCRIPTION

The Hong Kong Palace Museum (HKPM) is pleased to present a new thematic exhibition, The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: The Forbidden City and the World — Cultural Encounters, from 3 June 2026 in Gallery 1 of the HKPM.

Positioned within a global context, the exhibition presents the Forbidden City as a vital platform for dialogue between China and the world across the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, showcasing interactions in diplomacy, trade, science and technology, philosophy, and craftsmanship. The Forbidden City and the World is jointly organised by the HKPM and the Palace Museum, and solely sponsored by The Hong Kong Jockey Club Charities Trust.

The exhibition highlights significant events and figures in China’s exchanges with the wider world over more than 600 years during the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties. From the cloisonné enamels of the Yuan dynasty to the European clocks in the Qing court, and from Zheng He’s monumental maritime expeditions to the export trade managed through the Canton Customs, the Chinese imperial courts absorbed influences from afar, while Chinese silk, porcelain, tea, and other treasured goods were exported to the wider world.

The Forbidden City and the World showcases over 130 precious artefacts. Anchored by the Palace Museum’s collection, including 18 grade-one national treasures, the display is further enriched by significant objects from the HKPM, the Chris Hall Collection at the Hong Kong Palace Museum, and the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha, with categories ranging from paintings and calligraphic works to jewellery, timepieces, ceramics, glassware, furniture, silk textiles, and scholars’ objects.

The HKPM and the Palace Museum are presenting four new thematic exhibitions in 2026. Among them, The Hong Kong Jockey Club Series: The Forbidden City and the World — Cultural Encounters, presented in Gallery 1, serves as an introduction to the history and culture of the Forbidden City, providing context for other thematic exhibitions featuring objects from the Palace Museum.