Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes on the Great Northwest Ring Road

Dunhuang, famous for the Mogao Grottoes, is a node city of the Silk Road, famous for its "Dunhuang Grottoes" and "Dunhuang Murals", and the world heritage site of the Mogao Grottoes and Yumenguan and Yangguan on the border of the Great Wall in Han Dynasty.

During the summer vacation of 20 19, the most important point of the Great Northwest Ring Road was Dunhuang, where I stayed for two nights. I went to Dunhuang for the Mogao Grottoes, because my friend's daughter Qian studied art, and she said that people who studied art would go to Dunhuang countless times in their lives. I am an amateur, and I don't understand the thinking of artists. I was not interested in human landscape before, because I didn't know the past life of human landscape. For me, without translation, it would only be a blur! I went to Dunhuang this time because it was hard to get a ticket to the Mogao Grottoes, and the northwest Great Ring Road was 2800 kilometers, so I went with the group myself. Tickets for the Mogao Grottoes were bought by travel agencies. We watched the theme digital movie "Millennium Mogao Grottoes" and the curtain movie "Dream Buddha Palace" and went to Mogao Grottoes by bus. When we got off the bus, there was yellow sand everywhere, and we lined up to enter the scenic spot. We have a group of 20 full-time commentators, and everyone is wearing headphones. Up to now, there are 492 caves in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes in the Sixteen Kingdoms, Northern Wei, Western Wei, Northern Zhou, Sui, Tang, Five Dynasties, Song, Xixia and Yuan Dynasties, with a large scale, and 492 caves are now well preserved. Because there are too many tourists, every cave has to be visited in groups in order to reduce the damage. Every cave is a treasure house of Buddhist art, and every cave is locked. Only when the narrator chooses to unlock the cave can he enter the cave. Photographing is forbidden in the cave.

The excavation of the Mogao Grottoes is attributed to a monk named Le Zun. It is said that in 366 AD, Le Zun traveled here and suddenly saw the golden light on Mingsha Mountain, which looked like a thousand buddhas. He realized that he had carved the first cave on the cliff. Since then, many merchants on the Silk Road have made a wish to dig grottoes here in order to pray for a smooth road ahead and developed commerce, and asked folk artists to draw the images of the gods they worshipped. From the Sixteen Kingdoms to the Yuan Dynasty, the excavation of the Mogao Grottoes lasted 10 dynasties.

As soon as you enter the Mogao Grottoes, the first thing you see is the tallest building in this cave. It is also the 96th Cave of the Mogao Grottoes, and people used to call it the "Great Buddha Hall". It is said that Wu Zetian was in power at that time, in order to consolidate her throne and publicize that she was the incarnation of Maitreya Bodhisattva, so we can still find many female characteristics in the statues at that time, which was influenced by the background of that time. The cave is nine stories high, and the instructor also taught us how to count the floors.

During the Sixteen Kingdoms period, murals were concentrated in 272 caves, 275 caves and 286 caves. The characters in the murals are half naked and their movements are extremely exaggerated. Their faces and spirits are full of quiet and mysterious colors, with the artistic conception and style of western Buddhism. The contents of murals in the Northern Wei Dynasty are not only richer in Bunsen stories and Buddhist stories, but also have bizarre and tortuous karma stories. The native story of the dead king in Cave 254, the native story of Prince Sana 'a and the native story of Cave 257 deeply attracted tourists.

The most amazing thing is the colorful sitting Buddha sculpture in Cave 59. The commentator turned on the LED flashlight he carried with him, and a beam of light hit the sitting Buddha's face. We can see that this is a very beautiful meditation statue of the Northern Wei Dynasty. When you lean down a little and look at him, you will see him with a charming smile and look down on all beings. When the light shines in different directions, the facial expressions of sitting Buddha are different. The smile of the statue is particularly charming, comparable to that of Mona Lisa. Known as the "Mona Lisa of the East", this metaphor is not appropriate to explain Zhen Xuan. First of all, in terms of time, when Leonardo da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa, the statue had been smiling in the Mogao Grottoes for more than a thousand years. We listened with relish and were not bored at all.

Flying is the business card of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes and the symbol of Dunhuang art. As long as you see the beautiful flying, people will think of the art of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes. Almost all of the 492 caves in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes are painted with flying sky.

The commentator said that some cave murals have several dynasties, and because there is no place to repair caves, some of them are built on the basis of the original caves, just like scraping imitation porcelain in a house, scraping one layer and then scraping two or three layers, so a cave has the imprint of several dynasties.

After visiting the eight caves, we also visited the Dunhuang Grottoes Cultural Relics Protection Research and Exhibition Center, the Dunhuang Tibetan Sutra Cave Exhibition Hall, the Dunhuang Academy History Exhibition Hall and the Dunhuang Academy Art Museum for free.

Leaving the Mogao Grottoes and returning to the Digital Center, we watched Seeing Dunhuang again, because we wanted to know more about the Mogao Grottoes. Qian, the daughter of a good friend, said that she would never watch See Dunhuang again, saying that it would definitely be ugly. Amid her complaints, we watched Dunhuang again in the Water Cube, which is a scene performance project and a large-scale live performance project. Seeing this wonderful place, Ran Qian came over and said it was worth seeing! I smiled and said nothing. Children are children.

When you see Dunhuang again, you will feel that every figure in the murals and statues of the Mogao Grottoes has come alive. In the years of history, I have been living, living, alone and guarding, trying to tell visitors their beauty and brilliance.

"Look at Dunhuang again" theater means "a drop of water in the desert", "I am the boundless continent you look down on, I am the star you look up at, I am your moment, I am your Millennium." When Huang Qishan's song "One Thousand Years Later" was played, all the actors took a curtain call, rising and falling from the lifting platform, and time and space intertwined, which really made people cry!

After visiting the Mogao Grottoes and watching Dunhuang, I have a deep attachment to the oriental treasures. Qian said that she still wants to visit Dunhuang Mogao grottoes countless times and see all the caves she can see!