The ongoing Sixth Shanghai International Arts Festival is proving to be the largest arts and performance trade fair ever held in the history of the city.
Scheduled to run through to Wednesday, the five-day trade fair has attracted more than 150 performance agencies from nearly 30 countries and regions worldwide. The International Artist Managers' Association, a leading overseas association covering classical music artist managers and concert agents, also collaborated with the trade fair for the first time. The association took part in organizing the ``Sino-British Art and Performance Forum'' which attracted 23 top UK performance agencies to discuss how to further explore the bilateral performance market between the countries. As one of the most important sections of the annual arts festival, previous trade fairs have been effective in introducing some of China's newest stage productions to the overseas market such as the dance plays ``Wild Zebra'' and ``Farewell My Concubine,'' both produced by the Shanghai City Dance Company. ``Wild Zebra'' came to world attention at the trade fair and the closing ceremony of the city's second arts festival in 2000. It took more than US$1.2 million at the box office on its tours of Australia, America and Canada. The company has brought its latest production, ``Swan Lake,'' to this year's arts festival. It is an innovative acrobatic ballet reinterpreting Tchaikovsky's original score and includes award-winning Chinese acrobatic feats. The company sees Western countries as its target market. ``The success of `Wild Zebra' and `Farewell My Concubine' made us confident about the prospects for Chinese productions in Western countries,'' says Sun Mingzhang, general manager of the company. ``But we are not content with treating overseas audiences with rustic, old-fashioned works as you can hear people talk about the fusion of chic and classic everywhere at the fair.'' Co-produced with the Guangdong Acrobatic Troupe, a three-time winner of the Golden Clown Award (one of the three highest acrobatic awards in the world), ``Swan Lake'' will begin a run at the new Shanghai Oriental Arts Center in Pudong on January 1 next year. ``I see a great level of originality in this production which works well with Western music,'' says Patrick Condon from Condon Entertainment of Australia, the promoter of ``Wild Zebra.'' ``Chinese acrobatics are not seen very often in Western countries and the exposure of the play at the trade fair has been a good opportunity to change the perception of Chinese culture held by some in the Western world,'' Condon says.