What are the subjects of the cave murals?

The surviving Northern Dynasty grotto murals are an important source for understanding Buddhist painting of the era, with the Kizil Grottoes and the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang being the most famous.

Of the 236 caves in Kizil, more than 70 have well-preserved murals. The earliest surviving murals probably began in the second half of the 4th century and continued into the 7th and 8th centuries. The main themes of the mural paintings are the saying of the Buddha, the story of the Buddha, the story of the life of the Buddha and the story of the parables. Especially in the form of Bunsen story painting is the most unique, are in the form of a single performance of a story content, this unique form of early Dunhuang murals have a certain influence.

The world-famous Dunhuang's first cave was built in 366 A.D. The murals and colorful sculptures in Dunhuang's early caves were influenced by India and Central Asia, and the distinctive "Dunhuang style" did not begin to appear until the Northern Wei Dynasty, when the influence of the Chinese culture became more pronounced in the Western Wei Dynasty. The paintings created in this period are mostly stories of the Buddha's life and stories of monks and nuns. Overall, Dunhuang art in the Northern Dynasties period energetically went through a process of gradual localization, at which time subjects imported from India and Central Asia and themes and styles originating in China tended to converge in a unique way in the same cave, which is reflected in a concentrated way in Cave 249, built at the end of the Northern Wei dynasty. In this cave, the front Buddha statue is flanked by Bodhisattvas and Flying Sky, the Buddha statue is surrounded by a number of small Buddha statues, commonly known as the "Thousand Buddhas"; above the colorful niches of the Buddha is painted with playing a variety of musical instruments in the Flying Sky of the Musical Instruments. Representative caves are 275 caves (Sixteen Kingdoms), 257 caves (Northern Wei), 254 caves (Northern Wei), 428 caves (Northern Zhou), 285 caves (Western Wei) and so on.