Invited to mark the arrival of spring, a group of artists traveled through villages and historic sites in southwest China, encountering rituals, landscapes, and everyday traditions along the way.
GUIYANG, China, Feb. 11, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- As spring arrived in Guizhou in early February, a group of Hong Kong artists found themselves traveling through the province, moving between historic towns, village rituals, and shared meals tied to the rhythms of the season. Their journey, timed to Lichun—the traditional Beginning of Spring—took shape across several days and locations, offering a close look at how local customs, landscapes, and everyday life intersect at the turning of the year. The artists, including Natalis Chan Pak-Cheung, Eddie Cheung Siu-fai, Edwin Siu Ching Nam, Priscilla Wong Tsui-yu, and Jacquelin Ch'ng Se Min, were taking part in a "Fortune"-themed itinerary introduced in Guiyang at the 2026 Spring Tourism Product Promotional Conference, hosted by Guizhou Tourism Industry Development Group.
During the days leading up to the Spring Festival, the artists traveled through Guizhou as blessing rituals and seasonal customs came into focus across the province. Their journey, which ran from February 3 to 6, moved through a series of settings tied to ideas of fortune and renewal, from hands-on craft traditions to shared meals shaped by ritual practice. At Colorful Guizhou City, they moved between expressions of different ethnic cultures, cutting "Fu" characters from paper, learning traditional batik techniques, preparing matcha, and sitting down to a meal inspired by the ceremonial traditions of Nuo opera. Several Guizhou dishes, each associated with good fortune and blessings, stood out as among the most memorable parts of the experience.
At Yunfeng Tunpu, on the outskirts of Anshun, stone-walled lanes and squat watchtowers give the village the feel of a place suspended in time, their origins tracing back to the Ming era. Shaped by more than six centuries of military garrison history and the traditions of Dixi, or ground opera, the setting drew the artists into its rhythms almost immediately. They painted masks, put on traditional costumes, and stepped into Dixi performances themselves, later describing Yunfeng Tunpu as "a living history book" that offers a tactile sense of how China's traditional culture continues to endure.
In Biasha, a village often described as "China's last gunman tribe," the artists encountered a set of blessing rituals still woven into daily life. Ceremonial gunfire marked prayers for good fortune, village elders led well-wishing rites, and fortune-seeking ceremonies took place beneath ancient trees that anchor the community's sense of continuity. Through these encounters, the artists came to understand Biasha's tree culture, shaped by a long-standing relationship between people and the natural world. They planted saplings of their own, and as they pressed soil around the young trees, reflected quietly on ideas of resilience, renewal, and life taking root in a landscape shaped by time.
Food became a steady companion throughout the journey, with meals offering an introduction to Guizhou's regional cooking traditions. At the Jun Tun and the Miao Long-Table banquets, dishes arrived one after another, each reflecting a different facet of local cuisine. Natalis Chan lingered over a sour soup chicken served at the Jun Tun Banquet, describing it as "refreshingly tangy, flavorful, and wonderfully tender—an unforgettable taste of Guizhou." Drinks, including locally roasted coffee and tart sea buckthorn juice, rounded out the meals with flavors distinctive to the region. Traveling in small groups and compact vehicles, an approach deliberately adopted by Guizhou Tourism Industry Development Group, the artists moved easily between stops, an unhurried pace that Eddie Cheung later pointed to as one of the journey's strengths.
By the end of the journey, the theme that framed the itinerary had receded into the background, replaced by moments drawn from daily life—shared meals, local rituals, and time spent moving through landscapes shaped by history. The artists reflected on Guizhou through what they saw and experienced firsthand, from village customs to everyday scenes that rarely make it into travel brochures. Traveling alongside artists from Hong Kong and Macao, the journey opened a window onto the province for audiences beyond the region, carried not by slogans but by stories shaped through direct encounter.
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