Dunhuang in London | The Universe of Light, Colour and Pigment

In August, the King's Foundation School of Traditional Arts (KFSTA) China Centre has launched the "2023-2024 End of Year Exhibition" at Yuan Centre in Suzhou. As part of the cultural and artistic exchanges between the East and the West, a selection of works created by the China Centre's students on the course ‘Mineral Pigment Painting in Buddhist Art’ were featured in the exhibition ‘The Universe of Light, Colour and Pigment’ in London.

This exhibition, held by KFSTA, celebrates the School’s unique engagement with pigment, and how it has been extended and explored in the work of its tutors, students, and alumni worldwide.

The exhibition shares over 150 pieces of artwork by tutors and alumni of the School from the past 3 decades. Every student who has passed through the programmes at the School of Traditional Arts in London and abroad has been profoundly affected by the alchemical engagement with pigments and colours and then as applied in various traditional arts.

The Dunhuang polychrome cave paintings from China were executed primarily using mineral pigments, giving them a strong decorative quality and aesthetic appeal, and infusing them with the luminous natural beauty and rich texture of natural minerals. Moreover, because mineral pigments have the physical property of neither fading nor changing colour over time, these paintings have retained their original brilliance and charm even after the passage of many centuries.

‘On the Silk Road: Mineral Pigment Painting in Buddhist Art’ addresses both the theory and practice of polychrome mural painting at the Dunhuang Grottoes. The painting technique taught by Prof. Wang Xueli of the Dunhuang Institute is of the secco type, presenting an interesting contrast to the tempera technique taught in an earlier session by British expert David Cranswick.