Note: This is a mural produced in the last fifty years by an artist who is presumably still alive. I do not have copyright in any way over this artist’s work. I’m reproducing it here because (a) these images are of ethnographic interest, (b) I’d hope that shining more light on contemporary mural and scroll painters will ultimately be good for their trade, and (c) frankly, these people seem unlikely to sue me. To that last point: It’s possible to commission murals or scrolls very easily in the villages around northern Shaanxi. If you’re interested, email me and I’d be happy to give you the contact information of several painters we met.

Structure Type: Village temple 村廟.

Location: Li Family Gulch Village, Jia County, Shaanxi Province 陝西省佳縣李家坬村. The temple is on a hill over the village.

Period: 1992. A stele records the rebuilding of this temple in that year.

Artist: Zheng Jinlai 鄭進來.

Mural Contents: The Three Emperors should be Fuxi 伏羲, Shennong 神農, and Xuanyuan 軒轅. Around them are a great number of other deities, including the Second Lad 二郎 and the Dragon Kings 龍王, whose procession occupies the side-walls.

Other Notes: These photos are bad but instructively so. These contemporary Shaanbei shrine rooms give a good sense of how the older murals would have been seen. Murals on temple walls would be replicated by statues set in front of them on altars. Banners and lists of donors covered the walls. Rooms were dark and filled with incense smoke, such that details of deities and scenes on the walls would be all but lost in the gloom.

Full Gallery