Calendar celebrates Dunhuang and Year of Dragon

The Dunhuang Calendar 2024, which highlights UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, Gansu province, was recently published by the Dunhuang Academy and Beijing-based CITIC Press Group.

The calendar shows 309 murals from the Sixteen Kingdoms (304-439) period to the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368), with captions explaining the content. They show changes in traditional Chinese dress, architecture of various dynasties and ancient forms of entertainment.

Moreover, next year is the Year of the Dragon. Dunhuang has many murals with patterns of dragons, and the calendar shows some of them, like scenes of a wandering dragon floating among the clouds, and an immortal riding a dragon while controlling the wind.

Next year also marks the 80th anniversary of the establishment of the Dunhuang Academy. The calendar shows 57 copies of Dunhuang murals painted by 15 scholars who visited the caves from 1943 to 1964, as a way to pay tribute to their spirits of protecting the caves, and remind people to continue their cause of protecting cultural relics.