The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]

A new project at the Shanghai Museum invites the digital avatar of Jay Chou, one of the most influential figures in China's pop music scene, to take visitors on an immersive experience of the cultural relics in the museum's collection.

To coincide with the 36th Shanghai Tourism Festival, the themed art show "Remarkable Ancestors – Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures", is being featured at the Shanghai Museum on People's Square from Sept 30 to Mar 8, 2026.

The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]

The exhibition takes Chouchou, the official anime-style IP character of Jay Chou, as the starting point, and employs digital technology and trendy artistic vocabularies, to integrate 12 precious cultural relics from Shanghai Museum with AI, holographic projection, interactive robots, NFC digital cards, and other new technologies. It creates an immersive cultural experience for the public that combines tradition with modernity, past with the future.

The show marks the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional culture with contemporary trendy pop art, Chu Xiaobo, director of Shanghai Museum, said at the opening on Sept 29.

The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]

The jade, bronze, blue-and-white and pastel porcelain in the museum not only tell about the glory of ancient Chinese civilization, but also the wisdom and warmth passed down by our ancestors, Chu said. "This time, we attempt to approach them in a more youthful and contemporary fashion and embark on a new innovative journey...we hope to learn from the great ancestors while using trendy creativity to continue the tradition and inject new life into the ancient artifacts."

The project was jointly produced by Shanghai Museum and Star Plus Legend Holdings Ltd. Vincent Fang, a renowned lyricist and long-time collaborator of Jay Chou, is the chief cultural officer of Star Plus Legend, and a cultural and creative consultant for the exhibition. Fang said that the show's theme "perfectly echoes our years of exploration in music creation: how to combine tradition and pop culture in an organic way and achieve the natural integration of ancient heritage and modern expression."

The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]

The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]

The show themed "Remarkable Ancestors - Chouchou's Time Travel Adventures" opens to the public at Shanghai Museum on People's Square on Sept 30. This is the first time Shanghai Museum has launched a cross-over initiative that integrates traditional Chinese culture with contemporary pop culture. [Photo provided to Chinadaily.com.cn]