Dunhuang—the Crown Jewel of Buddhist Art
(佛教艺术的宝库—敦煌)
From the 4th to 14th centuries CE, the city of Dunhuang (敦煌), in northwest China, was a key intersection in the ancient Silk Road—a network of trade routes that connected China with Central and West Asia. To Dunhuang’s east, the Silk Road led to China’s ancient capital Chang’an (长安, today’s Xi’an [西安]) over 1500 kilometers away. To the west, the Silk Road splits into two branches; the southern branch passed through Kashgar (喀什), China’s west-most city, into Central Asia and Middle East, while the northern branch led to Russia. If you have the impression that Dunhuang is surrounded by deserts, you are right. The photo below, taken only a short drive from the city center in my 2018 visit, shows an infinite span of sand dunes.
About 20 kilometers from Dunhuang, over 700 cave-temples of various sizes—each with murals and sculptures—were literally carved into a desert cliff (photo below). These cave-temples, historically built by donors who used them for Buddhist worship and pilgrimage, are collectively known as the Mogao Caves (莫高窟) and are designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The construction of these cave temples was not for artistic expression, but motivated by karma—the Buddhist belief that virtuous deeds, including glorifying Buddha, generate merit, which improves fortune in the next life. Front and center in the Mogao site is a nine-story tower (feature image); inside is a 33-meter (108 feet) tall Buddha statue.
These caves were first built on this site in the 4th century and continued to be built until the Yuan Dynasty (元朝) in the 14th century, with creative activities reaching an unprecedented height during the Tang Dynasty (唐朝) between 7th and 9th centuries. With over 2000 sculptures and 40,000 square meters of murals, the Mogao site is a treasure trove of information about ancient China’s religion, culture, and social life.
In the late 14th century, the Ming Dynasty’s (明朝), without a strong military, set its western boundary at Jiayuguang (嘉峪关), some 400 kilometers east of Dunhuang. Moreover, when the maritime trading routes—from Mediterranean, through the Indian Ocean, to the Western Pacific—began to flourish by the 16th century, the land-based Silk Road, together with Dunhuang, lost its allure. It became a remote town outside of China’s western border and the Mogao caves experienced centuries of relative decline and oblivion. Until about 1900 in the Late Qing period, the Mogao Caves were largely undisturbed. Then archaeological explorers from Europe and North America discovered the caves and stole almost all portable relics such as Buddhist scriptures and small statues; many are still kept in museums around the world. The remaining immovable murals, large statues, and sculptures carved on the walls, constitute today’s Mogao collection.
For a thousand years, Dunhuang was a cradle of religious, commercial, and culture exchanges along the Silk Road. “From the cave paintings, we are able to form a picture of Dunhuang during the years of its greatest importance—a city of wealth, color, noise, and bustling activities—where caravans of merchants, traders, and adventurers assemble before journeys that would last for months…” wrote a traveler to the Dunhuang area in the 1940’s.
The Mogao site is now under strict management and protection: the total number of visitors per day cannot exceed 6,000; all visitors are led by guides in small groups; photography is not allowed; only a small number of caves are open at any one time; and the caves are illuminated only by the guides’ flashlight. However, readers can roam through about two dozen caves in the “Digital Dunhuang” website E-Dunhuang.com offered by the Dunhuang Academy. The image below shows the interior of a cave from Digital Dunhuang.
Dunhuang, a vital trading hub between China, Central Asia, and beyond, was a melting pot of cultures. Thus Dunhuang art displays a rich blend of Chinese, Indian, Central Asian, and Persian influences. The Mogao Caves stand as a record of cross-cultural exchanges that lasted over a thousand years.
Early Dunhuang art is deeply rooted in Indian Buddhist traditions in iconography of serene and meditative expressions (first image below), and the use of halos, hand gestures, and lotus motifs (second image). Because no photography is allowed inside the caves, the images below are from the book A Selection of Restored Wall-Paintings of Dunhuang《敦煌壁画复原精品集》(甘肃人民美术出版社).
Chinese influence permeated Dunhuang art in the depiction of palaces, clothing, and ornamentation, especially during the Tang Dynasty, as shown in the image below.
Many figures in Dunhuang art—especially in ways they are dressed—reflect Persian influence. The image below shows a woman’s nude upper-body scantily clad in scarfs with floral patterns, while the lower body is in a flowing skirt with intricate folds, indicating a probable Persian influence. The facial features of this figure are distinctly non-East Asian.
The paintings of Dunhuang also indicate the influence of different cultures on the music of the time. Long before the 1st century CE, large percussion instruments such as bronze bells, drums, and stone chimes, had been developed in China. However, after the start of the Silk Road, most of the immobile percussion instruments were gradually replaced by wind and string instruments, such as arched harps, lutes, mouth organs, and flutes. Dunhuang art shows evidence of the movement of different musical instruments across the Silk Road. The wall painting below shows three musical instruments—arched harp, mouth organ, and lute—that have a Central Asia origin.
The extent to which Dunhuang was a melting pot where ethnic, religious, artistic, and cultural traditions came together, is directly depicted in some of the city’s local art. Each of the three Dunhuang paintings below shows an ensemble of people of multiple ethnicities, attires, and customs coming together.
Many of the Dunhuang paintings present visual narratives akin to storytelling. The 13th century painting below shows Xuanzang (玄奘) on his 7th century pilgrimage journey to India. The depiction of the mythical Monkey King accompanying Xuanzang on this journey was three hundred years before the fiction The Journey to the West, in which the Monkey King Wukong (悟空) was the protagonist.
The image below depicts the Prince Shanyou of the State of Boluoqin. While in exile in the State of Lishiba, he met the Queen of Lishiba and pursued a romance with her. Both the Sate of Boluoqin and the State of Lishiba were in the Indian Subcontinent.
Many wars were fought and dynasties rose and fell over the thousand years between the 4th and the 14th centuries, yet the Dunhuang art continued to flourish uninterrupted. Throughout these centuries, wealthy patrons commissioned wall paintings and sculptures as acts of devotion to Buddhism. These artworks reflect a rich history of religious devotion and cross-cultural exchange. Many later paintings also depict the mundane lives of people working in the fields, hunting, dining, singing, and dancing.
Dunhuang’s location on the Silk Road brought together influences from India, Central Asia, Persia, and China, enriching its art in terms of both the content and the techniques. Besides their artistic values, the Dunhuang wall paintings embody extremely valuable information about religious, cultural, and socioeconomic exchanges of civilizations on the Silk Road. Furthermore, the vast collection of Dunhuang manuscripts, most spread across museums in the West, offers valuable insights into the evolution of Buddhism and multicultural exchanges of the Silk Road.
Additional resource: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hJXRHYrWg4w&t=675s
Photo credit: ChinaDaily.com, E-Dunhuang.com, Getty Images