Impression Grottoes displays beauty of Longmen

Updated: 2015-11-03

Both tri-color glazed pottery and Longmen Grottoes are the characteristics of Luoyang city, Henan province. But what sparks will be made when the two bump into each other?

The tri-colored glazed porcelain painting of Impression Grottoes by Guo Aihe, China's ceramic art master, won golden award of the Baihua Prize, the highest award for China's industrial arts, on Nov 1.

The tri-colored glazed porcelain painting of Impression Grottoes by Guo Aihe [Photo by Guo Shasha / lyd.com.cn]

The painting was created with technique of Sancai, a Chinese porcelain characterized by a glaze with three intermingled colors. The producing technique of Sancai, which dates back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907 AD), was listed as one of China's National Intangible Heritages in 2008.

In the eyes of Guo, who is also the curator of Luoyang Sancai Art Museum, although Longmen is the concentration area of royal families' willpower to build statues, it also embodies the common people's revere and worship to the Buddhism. "By creating the Impression Grottoes, I try to break people's typical impressions to Longmen Grottoes and present a different kind of beauty by showing the small niches for Buddha statues," he said.

The Baihua Prize is considered as the annual Oscar in the field of China's industrial arts. The Impression Grottoes is the only golden award winner in Central China's Henan province.