Life along a narrow wet edge
Reeds, aquatic growth and planted trees occupy different parts of the spring’s setting. Their textures make the boundary between water and desert visible.
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Jiuquan
21 articles
The names of sand and water
Singing Sand, Sand Well, Medicine Spring, Crescent Spring: the place’s names gather sound, use and a distinctive shape.
Water at the edge of the routes
Dunhuang’s place in a network of journeys began with a landscape able to sustain settlement. The spring opens a small window onto that larger oasis.
The falling waterline and the spring’s recovery
The shrinking pool prompted decades of rescue work. Its recovery tells a story that reaches beneath the dunes into the wider basin.
How wind draws a dune
A grain’s short hop, a ripple and a long dune crest belong to different scales of movement. Wind and gravity connect them.
When sand begins to sing
Mingsha takes its name from a sound associated with moving sand. The physics begins with many grains acting together.
Water and dunes: a photographic portrait
A curved pool, a steep sand ridge, reeds and tiled roofs give Crescent Spring several scales of beauty. This illustrated feature moves between the whole basin and its smaller textures.
A town speaking in many scripts: the manuscripts of Cave 17
The Library Cave held Buddhist texts, letters, contracts, schoolwork and records in many languages—a paper archive of a changing oasis town.
Flying apsaras: motion without wings
Mogao's flying beings move through painted space with ribbons, clouds and instruments, turning the ceiling and upper walls into a field of music and motion.
The Nine-Colored Deer: a story painted across a wall
In Cave 257, a deer rescues a drowning man and asks him to keep one promise. A sequence of painted scenes turns the Buddhist tale into a visual drama.
The donors painted along the cave walls
Small portraits and inscriptions bring patrons into the sacred room, showing that Mogao was made through families, officials and communities as well as artists.
Caves built for circling, seeing and worship
Mogao’s caves are carefully designed rooms whose plans set the relationship between worshipper, central image and painted walls.