Location info and some photos withheld. As of my last visit, this mural site is vulnerable to theft or destruction. I have withheld the location beneath the county level and any photographs (of steles, signs, scenery, etc.) that might identify the place. If you are an accredited scholar and you have a good reason to want to see this information, email me and we’ll talk about it.
Structure Type: Buddhist Monastery 寺 or Daoist abbey 道觀, in principle. In practice, I doubt there were ever many Buddhists or Daoists here, and there are certainly none now, and thus the structure is just a village temple dedicated to the Three Purities.
Location: Yu County, Hebei Province 河北省蔚縣. The temple is located within the old fortress walls. It faces south, to an old opera stage.
Period: 1861-1875 [?]. A book has the characters 同治 “[reign of the] Tongzhi [Emperor]” (1861-1875) written on it; such books are usually meant to represent almanacs 憲書 from the year of the painting. The Tongzhi reign seems a little early to me for this mural (I would have supposed early 20th century), but it may be the case.
Artist: Unknown.
Mural Contents: This temple is eccentric in the extreme. The main hall contains “portico pictures” of the entrances to great palaces; outside this the scene becomes Korean “bookshelf paintings” (chaekgado 책가도, 册架圖), which wrap around the room.
Probably the strangest part of the structure is two panels which flank the doorway. These are a second set of “portico pictures”, which see a Daoist immortal-like figure peering out of a doorway. Above him, the most fantastic science-fiction background is scene, with bizarre saucer-spacecraft impaled on spikes from giant multi-story towers.
Finally, a side-hall exists which locals identified us as a shrine to the God of Wealth 財神廟. This shows figures riding out on giant, unidentifiable beasts.
Other Notes: This village is now mostly abandoned and is being reclaimed by foliage. Only a handful of intransigent old people remain. The monastery is collapsing and dangerous now to enter.
I visited this site once in summer 2017, at which time I took pictures with my terrible little point-and-shoot camera. Later on I visited the site again, but, thinking that my previous cameras had been good enough, I only took a few better-quality photos with the flash. I now strongly regret this carelessness – the place is unique and interesting, and seems to be physically collapsing at a very fast rate.
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