Royal Danish Embassy hosts culture night

On Wednesday night the 6th of March the Royal Danish Embassy in China hosted a combined event of the opening reception of the new “Young Artist Painting Exhibition at the Danish Embassy” and a conversation with the Danish author Mr. Jan Sonnergaard.

The Danish Ambassador to China, Friis Arne Petersen, opened the evening with a speech, where he welcomed the new paintings by the artist, Mr. Yu Jun, as well as Mr. Sonnergaard and other guests to the event.

The Danish Embassy is supporting upcoming Chinese artists with the “Young Artist Painting Exhibition” by giving them a platform to express their thoughts through art and to reach a new and important audience.

“At the same time many Danish business people, politicians, diplomats and students get the opportunity to see what happens on the Chinese art scene,” said the Ambassador.



Author Jan Sonnergaard (left) and Ambassador Friis Arne Petersen (right) at the Culture Evening at the Danish Embassy

The art exhibition is changed every third month and Mr. Yu’s paintings are displayed from March 2013 to June 2013. Mr. Yu, educated from the Central Academy of Fine Arts (CAFA) in Beijing, has exhibited his paintings since 2009, and in 2010 he won the Outstanding Graduate Work Award from the CAFA.

Evening of literature
After the opening reception of the new paintings, the Danish author Jan Sonnergaard entered the scene to talk about the Danish welfare system. Mr. Sonnergaard is known as a critic of the lifestyle in the Danish middle class and upper class, and in his dark stories he focuses on the negative sides of Danish welfare system.

When Mr. Sonnergaard had his debut in 1997 with the short story collection “Radiator” he was proclaimed spokesperson for a new, raw realism in which sex, drugs and violence have an important role. His latest novel “About the nuclear wars impact on Vilhelm Funks youth” was published in 2009.

More than 60 guests participated in the event. The guests were members of the Sino-Danish Alumni Network, students from the Sino-Danish Center and Danish Language Faculty at Beijing Foreign Studies University as well as journalists and fans from the Embassy’s Weibo profile.