Dragon is the spiritual totem of the Chinese nation. As the saying goes, “the dragon originated in the Liaohe River Basin”. Liaoning Province has given birth to a rich dragon culture. As the Year of the Dragon is approaching, Fatemeh, an Iranian student, went to the Liaoning Provincial Museum with her friends to explore the traces of dragons and feel the cultural charm that transcends time and space.
When it comes to Chinese dragons, international students have different images in their minds. Fatemeh sees the Chinese dragon as a symbol of courage, strength and power. Lyaisan, a Russian girl, considers the Chinese dragon as a strong, powerful and magical animal with bright colors. Azaliia reckons that the Chinese dragon is red and yellow, and can bring people good fortune. Anna thinks that the Chinese dragon is a confident and powerful creature with black eyes and colorful scales.
Following Fatemeh, international students entered the gallery with great anticipation. The first thing they found was the jade pig-shaped dragon, which was the original form of the Chinese dragon in ancient times. Unearthed at the Hongshan culture site, the jade pig-shaped dragon is a round and well-polished dragon with an amiable facial expression. Its body curled up in a circle. This precious antique confirms the truth that “the dragon originated in the Liaohe River Basin”.
In the ancient Liaoning gallery, Fatemeh found a small and naive “coiled dragon” on a beautifully crafted bronze vessel from the Western Zhou Dynasty-a bronze-covered lei with curved kui-dragon and interlaced dragons design. Compared to the highly abstracted design of the jade pig-shaped dragon, the “coiled dragon” is more three-dimensional and figurative, and the bronze vessel is covered with simplified kui-dragon motifs. International students gathered around the exhibition cabinet to look closely at the small “coiled dragon” and excitedly raised their mobile phones to take pictures from different angles.
Walking along the gallery, international students felt as if they were transcending time. When seeing the gold gilt silver belt in the exhibition cabinet, Fatemeh whispered: “It’s fantastic!” This is a piece of gold and silver ware from the Liao Dynasty. Upon closer inspection, they could see two extraordinary dragons sitting on the gorgeous gold gilt silver belt and looking up at the fire ball on the auspicious clouds. The appearance of these two dragons broke students’ stereotypes against the shape of Chinese flying dragons.
In the porcelain gallery of the Ming and Qing dynasties, a variety of exquisite patterns of porcelain dazzled the students’ eyes. It was easy for Fatemeh and her friends to find a lot of porcelains decorated with dragon motifs. The dragon motifs on the imperial kilns and wares of the Ming and Qing dynasties symbolized power and status. Due to the superior painting and firing techniques, the dragon motifs are exquisite. All the dragon motifs, no matter on blue and white porcelains or famille rose porcelains, attracted the students’ attention. They listened attentively to the lecturer’s introduction to the auspicious dragon motifs and witnessed the long history of Chinese civilization through the colorful dragon culture.
As they looked, searched and learned more about dragon culture, the museum was about to close. Fatemeh and her friends had something more to explore, so they took a group photo with a blue-and-white globular vase with cloud-dragon cloud-dragon pattern from the Ming Dynasty before leaving the museum. This is a photo that marks the precious memories of this “Dragon Exploration”. This is also a photo that travels through time and space, transcending national boundaries.
