As the first offline multimedia special cave exhibition authorized by Dunhuang Research Institute, the national first multimedia exhibition of “Wonderland of Dunhuang-Mystery of 220 legendary caves” was officially opened to the public in Shanghai on the 1st, and will last until March 22nd.
Digital technology allows Dunhuang art to “get out” of the grottoes, enter the city and approach more people. What development has Digital Dunhuang gone through over the years?
The Road of Digital Exploration in Recent 30 Years
Dunhuang, located at the throat of the ancient Silk Road, witnessed the history of multicultural exchanges and mutual learning between the east and the west. Among the Dunhuang Grottoes lasting for thousands of years, the exquisite murals, colored sculptures and grotto buildings recorded the history of trade, cultural exchange, religious spread and artistic development between China and countries along the Silk Road from the 4th to 14th century AD.
Yu Tianxiu, deputy director of the Dunhuang Protection Research Department and director of the Institute of Digitization of Cultural Relics, said in an interview with Zhongxin.com that one of the important reasons for the success of digitalization in Dunhuang is that we have been doing it all the time. “We started to explore how to preserve the information of grottoes in the early 1990s (in the last century), and we have been doing it until now, and only accumulated such a batch of materials in the last 30 years.”
Yu Tianxiu still remembers that at the earliest time, only a dozen caves were digitized. At that time, the application was very narrow. Some experts often said that they needed a photo, but just (that cave) was not digitized; Until the “digital caves” accumulated to a certain amount, and after more than 100 caves were digitized, all the authorizations of Dunhuang Research Institute were basically digital content, and the staff no longer had to take photos alone.
The right technology is the best technology.
Yu Tianxiu said that many people used to ask him if Dunhuang’s digital technology was the most advanced in the world. He often replied, “I can only say that it is the most suitable for the digitalization of Mogao Grottoes. It can solve all the problems of Mogao Grottoes and many common problems existing in cave temples; As for not being advanced first, I think this technology is the best as long as it can solve the problem. “
At the multimedia exhibition “Wonderland of Dunhuang-Mystery of Cave 220 of Legendary Caves”, digital technology also gives visitors in Shanghai a chance to feel the beauty of Dunhuang. The mini version of Cave 220 of Mogao Grottoes is exquisite in details, and the restoration of mural musical instruments and multimedia theater also make people feel like they have “entered” the prosperous times of the early Tang Dynasty in the caves.
Wu Qiongfang, deputy director and associate researcher of Dunhuang Cultural and Creative Research Center of the Institute, said that Dunhuang Grottoes has its own special place-it is an immovable cultural relic. “We can’t move the grottoes to other places for everyone to see, so we can only try our best to copy it. In the early years, it was copied by old artists. Later, with’ Digital Dunhuang’, we can present the murals and colored sculptures collected in high definition in a variety of ways. “
Let science and technology “history is never far away, and cultural relics are just around the corner”
Since the 1940s, several generations of Mogao people have stuck to the desert to protect and study Dunhuang Grottoes. There are 75 preserved caves, more than 2,000 colored sculptures, 45,000 square meters of murals and tens of thousands of relics of Tibetan scriptures caves, which together constitute the splendid Dunhuang art and culture.
The multimedia exhibition in Shanghai, “I don’t want to know in general terms, but I want to read carefully”, focuses on a legendary cave-Cave 220 of Mogao Grottoes.
Wu Qiongfang said that we have never thought of defining Dunhuang for the audience with exhibitions, but rather wanted to build a bridge to close the distance between Dunhuang and the public. “Because Dunhuang is a ever-changing beauty with different eyes, different professional backgrounds, different age groups and different cultural backgrounds, the Dunhuang we see is different, which is the greatest charm of Dunhuang.”
From the 1940s and 1950s to today, Dunhuang Research Institute has held and guided one Dunhuang exhibition after another. With the development of science and technology, “Digital Dunhuang” will undoubtedly further push Dunhuang art out of the “grottoes” and into the world. Reporter Beebee Cheng