SHANGHAI, Nov. 20 (Xinhua) -- Vacheron Constantin, the Swiss watch giant, has little enthusiasm for pop stars to promote its products. It prefers something that matches its 252-year-old brand, such as the fine arts.

    It chose Oscar-winning Chinese musician Tan Dun last month and sponsored his Water Concerto in the financial hub, Shanghai, an event it believed was in line with its "exquisite" brand image, according to the watch manufacturer.

    The booming Chinese arts scene can be partially attributed to support by both the government and private sector, according to Chen Shenglai, president of the center of China Shanghai International Arts Festival, the largest event of its kind in China.

    Chen said there were many symphony orchestras, dances, musicals and ballets from home and abroad, and more than 6,000 arts festivals, held in China each year. These events are jointly sponsored by the government and private businesses.

    Jointly hosted by the Ministry of Culture and the Shanghai Municipal Government, the Shanghai International Arts Festival, which ended last weekend, has served as a cultural gala and an artistic pageant bridging China and the world annually since 1999.

    Chen said on average, the total cost of the festival was around100 million yuan (13.16 million U.S. dollars), with about 10 to 12percent from the government budget and the rest from business sponsorship.

    "The official support for arts and cultural events is indispensable in China so as to ensure the full access of arts and cultural fruits by the general public," said Chen.

    He said 40,000 "low-priced tickets" for 50 performances, including those by world-renowned orchestras and ballet troupes, had been offered to the public at 10-50 yuan (1.32-6.6 U.S. dollars), with the help of local government funding.

    "The government will increase spending in supporting the development of arts and cultural industries, in accord with the essence of the Party Congress held last month," Chen said.

    Meanwhile, more private enterprises keen to be "patrons of the arts" are footing the bill of arts events in China.

    The 135-year-old Shanghai-based China Merchants Group (CMG) on Sunday night sponsored a concert by the 111-year-old Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, an indisputable authority in performing the music of Slav maestros such as Antonin Dvorak, which closed the month-long Shanghai International Arts Festival.

    Zou Bin, vice-manager of the administration department of the CMG, said that "the CMG and the orchestra shared long histories. The orchestra played renowned Czech composer Bedrich Smetana's popular 'My Fatherland' at the Shanghai-debut concert, which showed the patriotic sentiment of the CMG."

    The principal conductor of the orchestra, Zdenek Macal, was grateful for the sponsorship, saying he "had probably spent more time looking for sponsorship than in conducting".

    Japan's Panasonic sponsored the ballet "The Magpie Bridge" by famous Chinese ballerina Tan Yuanyuan, which was staged during the festival in Shanghai and jointly produced by artists from China and Japan to mark the 35th normalization of the bilateral relationship.

    As one of the first Japanese companies coming to China in the 1980s, Panasonic, one of the symbols of the commercial ties of the two countries, got returns from the "strategic" sponsorship, such as promoting the image of the company by printing logos on tickets and brochures.

    Yao Wang, CEO of the Bo'ao Asia Forum, said sponsoring arts could bring "immeasurable benefits" to sponsors, not only showing the enterprises' "artistic taste" but also refining a "graceful" corporate image.

    However, Chen said due to a lack of relevant preferential policies, China was still "at a preliminary stage" in the field of sponsorship compared with its Western counterparts.

    Shen Danyang, vice president of the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, also pointed out that China has offered no tax rebates to art sponsors, which otherwise could be a great incentive to encourage arts sponsorship by enterprises.