ENG-2016 — Page 398

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Recreation, Sport, Culture and the Arts

Hong Kong Space Museum

The Hong Kong Space Museum organises regular astronomy activities on-site and holds. stargazing and family programmes at its Astropark and iObservatory in Sai Kung. In 2016, it presented two Omnimax Shows, one 3D Show, two Sky Shows and four school shows at its Stanley Ho Space Theatre.

On 9 March, a partial solar eclipse was visible in Hong Kong. Riding on this special astronomical phenomenon to promote astronomy, the museum conducted observation activities at the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront and Central's Statue Square. About 450 people took part.

The permanent exhibition halls were closed for exhibit renewal in 2016. During this closure, the museum launched a new outreach programme, 'Stargazing@School, bringing a portable planetarium and telescopes to schools to introduce stargazing and constellations to primary and secondary students.

Some 226,000 people attended shows in the space theatre, while more than 29,000 took part in the educational and extension programmes.

Hong Kong Film Archive

The Hong Kong Film Archive offers the permanent exhibition, 'In Memory of Queen's Theatre. It organised four thematic exhibitions in 2016: 'Behind the Glamorous Scene - 80th Anniversary of Cathay, 'The Great Entertainer: The Heyday of Cinema City', 'Light and Shadow: Tricks and Treats Workshop-cum-Exhibition' and 'Sketches in Motion: Storyboards of Hong Kong Cinema More than 169,320 visitors were recorded during the year.

The archive acquired 256 films and 24,483 film-related materials, including film pre-print materials such as picture negatives, digital intermediates, soundtracks, subtitles, inter-picture negatives, inter-positives, film prints, footages, magnetic tapes and trailers. Major acquisitions included 35mm pre-print materials from four titles and 12 titles donated by We Pictures and Applause Pictures respectively. First Distributors (HK) donated 16mm, 17.5mm and 35mm pre- print materials from 103 titles dating from 1968 to 2008, while 17.5mm and 35mm pre-print materials from 128 titles dating from 1990 to 2012 and 204 film-related materials such as digital betacam tapes, betacam SP tapes, posters and documents were acquired from Universe Films Distribution. The archive also continued to duplicate film scripts and censor documents of Hong Kong films in the 1950s from the New York State Archives.

Public Libraries

The department operates 70 static and 12 mobile libraries and a books registration office. The libraries hold 12.52 million books and more than 1.83 million items of multimedia material, serving almost 4.45 million registered book borrowers and lending more than 50.5 million. books and other library materials in 2016.

Hong Kong Central Library

The Hong Kong Central Library is a major information and cultural centre, with a stock of more than 2.68 million books and other reading materials, multimedia facilities, a central reference

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