26 of the Mogao Caves at Dunhuang in Detail

This is a series of 29 short videos in Mandarin about the Mogao Caves, near Dunhuang in the Gobi desert. The caves were excavated by Buddhist monks, and decorated with an amazing array of painting and sculptures over a period of 1,000 years.

The caves are sometimes referred to as the Longest Art Gallery in the World, but unfortunately these days they have become too popular, and many of these caves you wouldn’t be able to enter even if you visited the site so this is maybe the only way to see many of the statues and paintings.

This series is the most comprehensive I’ve seen, and even though it is in Mandarin, and there are unfortunately no subtitles, it is still worth watching to gain access to some of these wonderful caves.

There are 26 10-minute videos in the complete series, but I have divided them into five videos for easier watching:

I have also uploaded stills of nearly every scene from the videos into five Facebook albums, which can be viewed by following the links below.

For a good illustrated article describing the caves in English see The Art of Dunhuang from the Dunhuang Research Academy.