Buddhist Cave Temples, Silk Road, China

The Iris (blogs.getty.edu); Crystal Quintero, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly

Interior and sculpture of a bodhisattva in Cave 275 (Courtesy of the Dunhuang Academy)

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Pyramidal interior of cave temple (The Iris)

The exhibition Cave Temples of Dunhuang: Buddhist Art on China’s Silk Road explores the history and art of the Mogao Caves in northwestern China.

The exhibit presents the story of preserving these caves, displays objects originally found there, and offers on the Getty Center plaza life-size, hand-painted replicas of three spectacular Mogao Cave Temples.

Also known as the Mogao Grottoes, this UNESCO World Heritage site is one of the great artistic and religious wonders of the world. Here is an introduction, via a few intriguing facts:

1. Mogao means “peerless.”

Excavated into a mile of cliff face outside Dunhuang, an oasis town at the edge of the Gobi Desert, the site’s Chinese name Mogaoku means “peerless caves.” More