National Museum of China, Beijing. The National Museum of China flanks the eastern side of Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China.
The museum's mission is to educate about the arts and history of China. It is directed by the Ministry of Culture of the People's Republic of China.
It is one of the largest museums in the world, and with 8.6 million visitors in 2018, the National Museum of China was the second-most visited museum in the world, just after the Louvre. The museum was established in 2003 by the merging of the two separate museums that had occupied the same building since 1959: the Museum of the Chinese Revolution in the northern wing and the National Museum of Chinese History in the southern wing.
The building was completed in 1959 as one of the Ten Great Buildings celebrating the ten-year anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China. It complements the opposing Great Hall of the People that was built at the same time.
The structure sits on 6.5 hectares and has a frontal length of 313 metres, a height of four stories totaling 40 metres, and a width of 149 metres. The front displays ten square pillars at its center. After four years of renovation, the museum reopened on March 17, 2011, with 28 new exhibition halls, more than triple the previous exhibition space, and state of the art exhibition and storage facilities. It has a total floor space of nearly 200,000 m 2 to display. The renovation