The annual Yilan International Children’s Folklore and Folkgame Festival has set up a special exhibition this year showcasing Slovakia, with the centerpiece a streetscape from the central European nation’s capital, Bratislava.
Replicas of popular bronze statues in Bratislava’s Old Town area, including one of Danish author Hans Christian Andersen (erected to commemorate his visit to the city in 1841), are on display in the exhibition hall at Yilan County’s Dongshan River Water Park.
Martin Podstavek, head of the Slovak Economic and Cultural Office in Taipei, said the Ahoj! Friendship Castle of Slovakia exhibition, which features folk furnishings and handicrafts from his country, was the largest of its kind in Taiwan and East Asia.
On Sunday, exhibition curator Pavel Holik, dressed in a traditional costume, played a tune at the show using a fujara, a 1.6m-long wooden flute that is a traditional musical instrument in the country.
The UN in 2005 named the fujura as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity.
Holik said people play the instrument in Slovakia on many different occasions, from weddings to funerals.
There are 12 traditional Slovak costumes on display at the festival, including a delicately embroidered 100-year-old bridal dress.
Lan-Yang Cultural and Educational Foundation specialist Wu Meng-chen (吳孟真), who spearheaded the efforts to create the exhibition, said the show would hopefully lead to more cultural interactions and exchanges between Taiwan and Slovakia.
Wu said the first Slovak visited Taiwan in the 18th century, when Maurice Augustus Count de Benyowsky, who was born in what is Slovakia today, but at the time was part of Hungary, traveled to the county’s Suao Township (蘇澳).
The Yilan International Children’s Folklore and Folkgame Festival opened on July 7 at the water park in Wujie Township (五結) and runs through Aug. 19.
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