On October 29, with leaves dancing in the best of autumn, the 4th “Red Leaf Festival” opened as promised. Students gathered at theFeng Jicai Research Institute of Literature and Art(hereinafter referred to as "Feng Institute"), a place with the most intense feeling of autumn, collecting red leaves, writing down wishes,recitingpoems, taking pictures, totally immersed in the golden days on campus.Yang Xianjin,the secretary of the Party Committee of Tianjin University,Lei Ming, deputyPartysecretary,and Feng jicai,deanof Feng Institute, attended the event.
The "Red Leaf Festival" is a poetic innovation of the institute for general education, which has been held every autumn since 2019. It uses the red leaves as "the postcard of autumn" to invite all students and faculty of Tianjin University to participate in a variety of attractive activities on campus, guiding and inspiring students to discover, create and enjoy beauty through literature and art. So far, the "Red Leaf Festival" has become an autumn cultural brand of Tianjin University.
Every year, new ideasspring upfor the festival. This year, the iron door in the corner of courtyard of the institute opened, whichhas beenclosed, so that everyone canramble aboutthe autumn here. Walking out of this door and looking back up, you will find a hidden scenery of the Feng Institute - the green ivy wall at this time gradually become tinged with autumn red, as if nature is here tofully displayits wonderment, students and faculty of the institute therefore named the wall "palette of autumn".
Under this palette, the youth lake sparkling, reeds swaying, leaves rustling. Students set up easels for sketching, tracing the fascinating scenery, and also gathered at the handicraft workshop to make rubbing paintings, thus creating a memento of autumn for themselves.
In the courtyard, in front of the bronze statue of poet Xu Zhimo, students performed on stage themselves in the poetry and music salon. The poems were the best works collected during the Red Leaf Festival in the past four years, written by students from different schools, most of whom from science and engineering majors. There were also guitar playing, erhu and bamboo flute ensemble, violin duet, piano solo and other musical performances, showcasing the artistic demeanor of students of Tianjin University. The Peiyang Chorus would certainly never miss, singing three songs adapted from Xu Zhimo's poems, plus two songs composed by Johannes Brahms and George Friedrich Handel.
In the poetry and music salon, a ceremony was held to start theme song and lyrics collection of “Songof the Red Leaves”. Feng Institute has made special preparations for the fifth Red Leaf Festival next year by collecting original lyrics, music and songs from all teachers and students who love composition and music. After professional evaluation, the excellent works will be presented in a theme exhibition in next year's Festival. At the ceremony,Prof. Feng and Prof. Yang Xianjin jointly unveiled the logo of "Song of the Red Leaves". In addition, Feng Institute invited Professor Ren Baoping, the honorary director of Art Education Center of Tianjin University and the famous choral conductor, associate professor Feng Gongjian, the deputy directors of the Center, and teacher Wen Yuchuan, as the artistic advisers of the event to provide professional guidance.
"Letters to your future self" is a newpartof Red Leaf Festival, an annual activity since last year. Last year, students wrote down their future hopes, wishes, aspirations and goals on cards, put them into envelopes anddroppedthem into three mailboxes - "2022", "2023" and "2024”. This year, the first batch of letters was delivered. A few days before the festival, the tasks of opening the “2022” mailbox and sorting theletters in it were finished, and the whole process was supervised by "student notaries". At the event, students received the letters they had written to themselves last year at the Chengxin Pool, as they wished. More people gathered at the table to write a letter and delivered it to their future selves.
In addition, students also took pictures at the most beautiful angle of Chengxin Pool,stoppedbythe red leaf wall next to Hangugate toappreciatephotographs and poetry, as well as searched forothersurprises of autumn in all corners of Feng Institute. In the melodious sound of the piano, everyone with their faces light up, released colorful balloons together, looking forward to a fantastic reunion in the next year's Red Leaf Festival.
By: Zhang Zanni
Editor: Qin Mian
