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Qinghai

Qinghai · Map

At Ta’er Monastery, butter becomes a temporary sculpture. In the Hehuang valleys, painted clay, embroidery and temple murals hold other kinds of time. Northward, Qinghai Lake is crossed by fish and birds; westward, salt works and telescopes bring two different kinds of work to the Qaidam Basin. Farther south, painters, carvers, herders and river patrols bring the headwaters into view through particular places and tasks. Follow the material, the water or the work: each route opens another Qinghai.

Qinghai
Xining Haidong Haibei Huangnan Hainan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture Golog Yushu Haixi

Selected waterways · simplified geography

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From the journal

Buddha Images Carved in Stone at He-ri Temple

He-ri Temple’s stone-carving tradition includes carved Buddha images as well as scriptures. The heritage record describes full forms, relief and carved line as distinct modes.

2 min readHuangnan
Original editorial diagram, not a photograph or measured plan: Three panels distinguish incised line, raised relief and rounded sculpture; no Buddha figure is reproduced.
Original editorial diagram, not a photograph or measured plan: Three panels distinguish incised line, raised relief and rounded sculpture; no Buddha figure is reproduced.

A figure emerging from stone

At He-ri Temple in Zeku, the local stone-carving tradition includes Buddha images as well as scripture texts. A national heritage record distinguishes the two, then names line carving, relief and round sculpture among the craft’s forms. The distinction changes how the viewer meets an image: a line incised into a stone surface, a figure raised from it, or a form shaped to occupy space around itself.

The record describes the Buddha figures as full in form, with flowing lines. Volume and contour carry a figure through the stone: the fall of a robe, the breadth of a shoulder, the balance of a seated body.

A local tradition, not a generic monument

The heritage record places He-ri Temple’s stone carving in He-ri Township and nearby areas of Zeku. It traces the practice to a temple patron who invited carvers to make both scriptures and Buddha images, followed by generations of monks and folk artists. That history gives the figures a setting in religious practice and local transmission.

The companion story about stone scriptures focuses on carved language; this one follows sculpted form. Together, scripture and image connect reading and viewing within the same temple carving tradition. The lettering draws the eye along a line; the figure asks it to follow volume and gesture.

Keep following the story

HuangnanThe Stone Scriptures of He-ri Temple The He-ri Temple stone-carving record describes scripture lettering as part of a local tradition in Zeku. The carved text turns stone into a durable page.
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Photo credits and rights
  1. Original editorial diagram, not a photograph or measured plan: Three panels distinguish incised line, raised relief and rounded sculpture; no Buddha figure is reproduced.© 2026 IFreeing · Rights information Photo source ↗ Proportionally resized and converted to WebP without cropping. No objects were added, removed or reconstructed.