The Nanjing Road Statues

The statues of Nanjing Road, in Shanghai

The statues of Nanjing Road are several bronze sculptures that punctuate the pedestrian street of Shanghai, among which the famous scene of a mother and her child. The Shanghai audio-guided tour stops here to evoke these realistic works that capture moments of daily life and bring a touch of tenderness to the heart of the commercial effervescence.

Tenderness in bronze amid the neon

While walking along the Nanjing Road, amid the luminous signs and the lively shop windows, you will cross several bronze sculptures that attract the gaze of the passers-by. The pedestrian street, sometimes nicknamed the golden belt, is thus punctuated with sculpted groups representing scenes of ordinary life. Among the most emblematic figures that of a mother and her child, placed directly on the street, between the People's Square and the Bund. The scene is simple and touching: a woman holds the hand of her child, while the latter raises the arm to wave, as if saying goodbye or hello to a friend. Made of bronze, this realistic sculpture captures a moment of daily life frozen in movement; the gentle expression of the mother, the joy of the child, the spontaneous gesture, everything evokes tenderness, urban life and family bond in the heart of the town. Other groups of the same register evoke couples or passers-by of the past, forming like a little theatre of bronze amid the crowd. These works, at the height of the stroller, invite to a pause and to photography, and contrast prettily with the commercial frenzy that surrounds them. They humanise the great avenue and recall that, behind the shop windows, it is above all the daily life of the Shanghainese that unfolds there. Street sculptures and moments of tenderness, the statues of Nanjing Road are a fine stop of the discovery of Shanghai.

What to see

Here you discover the bronze sculptures that punctuate the pedestrian street of Nanjing Road, and most particularly the group of a mother and her child, placed between the People's Square and the Bund: a realistic and touching scene, the child raising the arm to wave, that captures a moment of daily life and brings tenderness and humanity amid the commercial effervescence. The statues of Nanjing Road are a fine stop of Shanghai. It is a fine stop, to be explored on foot.

Practical information

The statues of Nanjing Road are on the pedestrian street of the same name, in the Huangpu district, between the People's Square and the Bund, reachable on foot. They are open-air works freely visible, amid the crowd. You discover them during a walk along the avenue.

What is the most famous statue of Nanjing Road in Shanghai?

The bronze group representing a mother and her child, placed on the pedestrian street between the People's Square and the Bund: a realistic and touching scene where the child raises the arm to wave, that captures a moment of daily life; it is part of the bronze sculptures that punctuate the avenue and bring tenderness and humanity there.

Where are the statues of Nanjing Road in Shanghai?

On the pedestrian street of Nanjing Road, between the People's Square and the Bund, in the Huangpu district, in Shanghai, in China.