Page 28 - The Golden Age of Chinese Archaeology: Celebrated Discoveries from the People’s Republic of China
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Bodhisattva as guide of
      souls. Ink and  colors on
                   7
      silk; height 80.5 (31 /s);
      Tang dynasty; from
      Dunhuang, Gansu pro-
      vince. Stein painting 47,
      ch.  LVII.OOZ. Courtesy of
      the  British Museum  (left).

      Kneeling attendant
      bodhisattva. Molded clay
      stucco over wooden arma-
      ture, gesso-covered  surface
      with polychomy and gild-
      ing; height 122 (48); Tang
      dynasty; from  Dunhuang,
      Gansu province (Fogg
      China expedition, 1923-
      1924). Courtesy of  the
      Arthur M. Sackler Museum,
      Harvard University Art
      Museums  (right).














                            Mongolia, and Tibet. During an expedition that lasted  from  1899 to 1902, he discovered  the
                                                                                    19
                            Loulan site at Xinjiang, an abundant source of historical  data.  Most of Hedin s surveys were
                            well documented  by maps, photographs,  drawings, and  site descriptions.  His last and  most im-
                            portant  joint venture with Chinese  scholars, the  Northwestern Scientific Investigation Group,
                                                                                    20
                             or Sino-Swedish Expedition, was led  by Xu Bingxu  (1888 -19/6)  and  lasted  from  1927 to 1935.
                            The cooperative  nature  of this expedition  resulted  from  protests by Chinese  academics, espe-
                                                                                                          21
                             cially members of the  faculty  at  Peking (Beijing)  and  Ts'inghua (Qinghua) Universities,  who
                             were unwilling simply to act  as observers in archaeological  excavations. Hedin agreed that all
                             artifacts  discovered would remain in China. With ten  Chinese  and  seventeen  European  scholars
                             at its start, Hedin's expedition remains the  largest joint Chinese-Western  archaeological  project
                             ever undertaken. 22
                                 The Geological  Survey of China, an  agency of the  Republic's Ministry of Agriculture and
                                                                                               23
                             Commerce, and  its founding director Ding Wenjiang (Chinese,  1887-1936)  played  vital roles
                             in the  early years of archaeological investigations in China. A British-trained geologist  who
                             sought  to promote  Western science  in China, Ding was appointed by the  government to the
                             Survey in  1916 to locate  mineral deposits.  Ding recruited  several distinguished  Western  scien-
                             tists to assist in the  effort.  The most influential and  well-known were Amadeus William  Grabau



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