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Arthur Sackler Museum Part
of the Beijing University archeology department, this museum has a
collection that spans 280,000 years, from the Paleolithic era to the
Qing dynasty. As well as fossils and bones, it includes beautiful
bronzes and fine ceramics. Ancient Architecture Museum Close
to the Temple of Heaven, south of Tian’an Men Square, this place is
worth visiting for the museum building alone, which is the pavilion of a
former grand temple complex . Capital Museum Formerly
housed in the Confucius Temple, this museum now boasts a huge, modern
five-story building near Fuxingmen. It documents Beijing’s history
through more than 200,000 relics and archival images. Among the several
permanent exhibitions is the fascinating “Stories of the Capital City –
Old Beijing Folk Customs” . Imperial City Museum After
wandering around the Forbidden City, call by this nearby museum to see
all the bits of imperial Beijing that didn’t survive. The walls and
gates that once encircled the city, along with literally dozens of
vanished temples, are revisited through a great many maps, models, and
photographs. Military Museum of the Chinese People’s Revolution Visitors
to the museum are greeted by paintings of Mao, Marx, Lenin, and Stalin,
at least two of whom were fully conversant with the various methods of
bringing death and destruction celebrated inside. The ground floor is
filled with fighter planes, tanks, and missiles, while displays upstairs
chronicle China’s military campaigns . China National Museum What
the Metropolitan Museum is to New York and the British Museum to
London, the China National is to Beijing. The building is currently
undergoing a massive restoration program and is slated to reopen in
2010. The focal point of the new design by German architectural firm gmp
is the building’s sensitive integration in Tian’an Men Square .
China National Museum
Science and Technology Museum Exhibits
at this suitably hi-tech looking complex start with ancient science and
come bang up-to-date with space capsules and magnetic-levitation trains.
Science and Technology Museum
Natural History Museum There
are around 5,000 specimens on display, including a fine collection of
models and skeletons of dinosaurs, and other creatures that are even
more prehistoric than the Socialist stylings of the museum building .
Natural History Museum
Beijing Police Museum Housed
in the 19th-century former City Bank of New York in the old Legation
Quarter, this surprisingly fun museum boasts displays on themes such as
the suppression of counter- revolutionaries and drug dealers. Famed
police dog Feisheng is here – stuffed and mounted – and there are live
transmissions from a roadside traffic camera. An interactive screen
poses legal questions and correct answers win prizes: it doesn’t say
what the punishment is for those who answer wrongly. 36 Dong Jiao Min Xiang 8522 5018 Subway: Qian Men Open 9am–4pm Tue–Sun ¥5
National Art Museum of China The
largest art museum in the country, with an impressive 64,580 sq ft
(6,000 sq m) of floor space, the National Art Museum of China hosts
exhibitions by internationally renowned Chinese and foreign artists.
Recent shows have included fascinating retro-spectives of Gerhard
Richter’s paintings and Cai Guo-Qiang’s gunpowder works .
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