A lot of folk art and culture is preserved in private collections that are kept on display for the public, thanks to financial assistance from the Minhang District government. Twenty private museums will undergo a government review in March to see if they continue to qualify for subsidies of up to 15,000 yuan (US$2,300) a year. Come with us on a tour of four of the collections to see what hidden treasures they have to offer.

Jingshangzhai Folk Collection Pavilion

For those obsessed with the Chinese sport of cricket fighting, Jingshangzhai is a must-see exhibition.

The exhibition hall on Zhongyi Road in the Qibao area displays hundreds of ceramic cricket pots, some dating back to the Ming and Qing dynasties.

The pots have intricate, exquisite designs featuring patterns of bamboo, chrysanthemum and plum blossoms - beloved subjects of Chinese poets and painters.

Zhang Deqing, owner of Jingshangzhai, said he spends his leisure time decorating his collection, mostly just for fun.

"I may add a jade lid on one of my cricket containers or invite my friends to engrave them with flowers, fish, birds, dragons or Chinese characters," he said.

Some exhibits are as beautiful as vases. Many pots were passed down from Zhang's father, who was a cricket buff.

"He interested me in trapping and breeding crickets when I was a young lad," Zhang said.

Most of Zhang's collection came from Lumu Village in Suzhou, which is famed for the tradition of making high-quality, well-ventilated cricket pots. Zhang bought pots from several well-known craftsmen, such as Yuan Zhongping and Shen Shinan.

He is never shy about sharing his enthusiasm or giving tips on cricket-breeding.

"A new pot must be dipped in green tea first and kept in the refrigerator overnight," Zhang said. "Then it is exposed to sunlight until it dries and turns white. Finally, it is moved indoors and placed in air-conditioning to cool down. Crickets like a cool, dry environment."

The museum also exhibits calligraphy works, tea pots, stones and paintings. Zhang helps finance its operation with the proceeds from a restaurant in Qibao that he and his wife run.

The Hanlin Inscribed Board Museum

The Hanlin Inscribed Board Museum on Hongxu Road bears silent witness to history with its collection of about 1,770 inscribed boards.

Stepping into the museum, visitors will feel like they are entering a reading room steeped in the reverence of ancient literati. The room's entry door is made of primitive bricks and stones. Inscribed boards are hung high along the walls. The wooden furniture sits in immaculate order.

The arrangement of every piece inside the museum strictly adheres to the setting of a typical reading room in ancient times.

Behind a wooden desk sits a man deeply intent on calligraphy and painting. He is Hong Tao, director of the museum, who devotes all his time to collecting and preserving inscribed boards.

The museum was among the first group of six private folk collection exhibition halls to receive district funding last April. It was granted 15,000 yuan and cited for the high quality of its displays.

Hong is happy to show visitors around. He points to a plaque that he says is the oldest in his museum, a wood board dating back to the Song Dynasty in 1266.

The board was written by Mai Zicheng, a literati scholar who served as an administrator of education in the government. The characters on the plaque refer to his job and symbolize his social standing, Hong explained.

"The Song government attached great importance to people of knowledge, and the literati usually enjoyed high social status," he said. Hong found the board in Jiangxi Province.

Most of the exhibits come from the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), when writing and presenting inscribed boards as gifts were popular.

The museum not only displays these great works but also serves as a research center.

"There are few studies focusing on inscribed boards," Hong explained. "Not a single official authority is involved in the management of these plaques."

Hong has spent 18 years collecting plaques from all over the country and conducting research into their history.

His quest has not been without some drama. One time, a man whose cart he used to transport dozens of inscribed boards he bought in the countryside of Jiangsu Province turned and accused him of illegally trading in cultural relics.

The police were brought in. Hong, who was almost arrested, had a lot of explaining to do. That's one reason he decided to open a museum, so that his motives couldn't be questioned.

The history of inscribed boards dates back to simpler times when life was recorded in symbols and the symbols were written in charcoal on pieces of wood, according to Hong's research.

"Since the Tang Dynasty(618-907), the heroes of warfare often sought gratitude from emperors in the form of inscribed boards rather than plots of land or other gifts," he said.

"They believed that the boards were more valuable and signified a top-level of glory that could be passed down to their descendants."

In the Song Dynasty, an era of thriving business, shops typically hung inscribed boards outside to advertise their services. Inscribed boards really reached the apex of their popularity and use in the Ming Dynasty, when building ancestral halls was common.

Inscribed boards hung in those halls were used to record a family's history and achievements.

The most valuable boards are those inscribed by famous calligraphers and honorable government officials.

"Inscribed boards epitomize Chinese culture and history," Hong said.

The plaques written by Qing Dynasty Prime Minister Wang Jie (1725-1805) and General Zhang Xueliang (1901-2001) are some of the most precious exhibits in the museum.

The museum receives an average of 30 to 50 visitors daily. It hosts a number of special events during the year under themes such as calligraphy and Chinese tea culture.

Although the "government funding is an encouragement for us," Hong said the museum still operates in the red. Its rent alone is 200,000 yuan a year, and that's before other operating costs.

Hong, a former businessman, said he leases part of the museum out for such events such as art salons and corporate annual meetings to try to make ends meet.

Dahetang Instrument Musemn

Dahetang is hidden away in an inconspicuous residential building in Minhang. From the outside, it looks like any other apartment not worth a passing glance, but open the door and you step into another world.

The air is filled with the sweet sounds of music harking back to ancient China. The museum is an exhibition of ancient instruments like the pipa (Chinese lute), huqin (Chinese stringed bowed fiddle) and guzheng (plucked and half-tube zither). Some exhibits are artifacts, such as an erhu (two-stringed bowed fiddle) that dates back about 100 years ago.

Shen Zhengguo, the owner of Dahetang, takes pride in his collection. A former staff member of the Shanghai Musical Instruments Factory, he has spent more than 30 years repairing and replicating traditional Chinese instruments.

At first, he only collected instruments. Then he realized that it was equally important to restore them because so many instruments had been ruined by war and dereliction. From there he progressed to delicate replicas of instruments sometimes lost in the ashes of time.

He and several other craftsmen specializing in traditional Chinese instruments set up a workshop dedicated to the restoration and promotion of the instruments.

The team collaborated with the Inner Mongolia Museum to make replicas of more than 10 typical musical instruments from the Ming and Qing dynasties.

Among the replicas now on display at the museum are the xiqin, a stringed instrument that first appeared during the Tang Dynasty, and the yueqin, a lute with a round wooden body.

All the materials and procedures used were in strict accordance with historical records provided by the Inner Mongolia Museum, Shen said.

"For example, when making the xiqin, we chose silk strings instead of commonly used steel strings, and sheepskin was used as its vibrating membrane, based on our research," he said.

The xiqin was originally played by the Xi tribe of northern China. They depended on sheep for food and clothing, therefore the sheepskin was the most readily available material in their instrument making, Shen said.

Shen and his crew were asked by the Minhang District Museum in 2008 to repair three guqin. That instrument dates back about 5,000 years and is considered one of the four cornerstones of high Chinese culture, along with calligraphy, the game of go, and painting.

It took more than a year to repair one guqin. A replica of the instrument takes two years to complete. Hundred-year-old wood is used and it takes at least two months to get the resonance of the instrument correctly calibrated.

"It is our hope that our works will be passed on from generation to generation," Shen said.

Although the government subsidy helps keep the museum operating, Shen said he also needs to find other sources of funding to make ends meet.

Banping Book House

The Banping Book House on Xinjian Road looks, at first glance, like a small, private library. It's a veritable treasure trove for bookworms to browse. Most of the collection comprises books from the past.

The most treasured exhibit is a book of poetry published in 1909 during the Qing Dynasty by Yu Hong, a celebrated writer from Anhui Province.

Yu admired the plum flower for its nobility and unyielding spirit, and in this book, he paid tribute to the winter bloom.

There are about 5,000 books in the collection, many of them tomes of poetry. Zhang Junyan, owner of the exhibition, is himself a poet.

Poetry has long been a revered art form in China. Many men of literature in ancient times presented books of poetry as gifts to others, covering the cost of printing themselves. That's what makes first editions of the books so rare and so valuable, Zhang said.

One of Zhang's favorite books is entitled "Letters of Girls," published in 1933. The letters are private correspondence between adolescents, expressing their joys and sorrows, and indulging in tidbits of gossip.

Zhang owns many books by Yu Dafu, a modern Chinese short story and verse writer, who is also Zhang's favorite poet.

Nowadays, Zhang is kept extra busy because he's chairman of the Minhang District Collection Research Association. When he has time, he scours secondhand book markets as far afield as Anhui and Zhejiang provinces, looking for prized works.