The beauty of the world and of imagination, one step at a time

Before visiting the recent Everlasting Beauty of Dunhuang exhibition at the Tsinghua University Museum of Art in Beijing, I had expected to see art that resembled the formalized figures normally attributed to Byzantine or Buddhist religious paintings. I was amazed at the vividness of life depicted from 1,500 years ago. We sometimes forget that people from the Middle Ages didn't stand around ramrod straight with halos around their heads.

Father-daughter artists Chang Shuhong and Chang Shana both devoted their lives to preserving the artworks in the Mogao caves in Dunhuang, Gansu province. They sketched the murals and studied their styles, preserving precious work that was otherwise quickly decaying.

I was especially inspired by a portion of a 5-meter-long mural titled Wubai qiangdao chengfotu (500 Thieves Become Buddhists), from the time of the Western Wei dynasty (535-557 AD). This portion shows people running, jumping and enjoying themselves in the mountains. It's a fantastic depiction of the joy of life.