On May 21st morning, the Rural Revitalization College of SDUFE held a special lecture by international experts. Soichiro Fukutake, a well-known global entrepreneur and creator of Japanese rural revitalization with art, was invited to deliver a lecture online. This online lecture was about the topic“Looking at Awaken the Country with Art from an International Perspective-Taking Benesse Art Site Naoshima and Peach Blossom Island in China as examples”for SDUFE faculty and students. Zhang Shuxue, vice president, Dong Fangjun, founder of Yiheyuan Pastoral Complex, dean of Rural Revitalization College, and more than 100 students from the School of Economics and the School of Literature and Journalism participated in the lecture.
Zhang Shuxue delivered a speech on behalf of SDUFEl, thanking Mr. Soichiro Fukutake for making a superb report to the faculty and students of SDUFE. He stressed that national rejuvenation depends on rural revitalization. The Central Rural Work Conference has planned for the overall promotion of rural revitalization involving rural industrial development, rural reform, rural construction, and urban-rural integration. Looking ahead to the bright future of rural revitalization, every one of us must make his efforts to make contributions from a new historical point. Shandong University of Finance and Economics actively responds to the Party Central Committee’s rural revitalization strategy, giving full play to its advantages to serve rural revitalization. The faculty and students actively participate in the construction of the project“Yiheyuan Pastoral Complex Rural Revitalization with Art”, and establish the Rural Revitalization College to promote rural revitalization with talent revitalization.
Soichiro Fukutake is an outstanding philanthropist and entrepreneur in the field of rural revitalization in Japan, and he introduced to everyone the practical experience of rural revitalization in Japan. The“Naoshima Model”was initiated by Soichiro Fukutake Foundation and Benesse Group, and it has made substantial achievements in Japan’s rural revitalization. In addition, it explained in detail how the regions of Japan’s Seto continental sea that have suffered from population loss and environmental destruction could be revived with prestige by modern art in over 30 years. Through his practice in the Yiheyuan Rural Complex Art Revitalization Project, he explored the experience of using the Naoshima model to help Yiheyuan Rural Complex and Peach Blossom Island Revitalization Through Art and made a comparative analysis between the Naoshima model and Peach Blossom Island Project for rural revitalization through art. The humanistic philosophy, charity philosophy, aesthetic appeals, and the transformation of backward rural areas embodied in the lecture given by Soichiro Fukutake, as well as the comparative analysis of practical cases, would help to deepen the theoretical innovation and practical development of the Qilu (Shandong province) model for rural revitalization through art.
In summary, Dong Fangjun stressed that the Benesse Group has successful experience in revitalizing villages through art for more than 30 years. This success can be used as a reference for how to deepen the rural revitalization model through art and the construction of Rural Revitalization Colleges.
