东千佛洞西夏壁画图像新释

A New Iconographic Analysis of Tangut Murals in the East Thousand Buddha Grottoes

瓜州地区榆林窟、东千佛洞保留的西夏洞窟及其壁画艺术不论是形式上的完整性、艺术性还是图像背后蕴含的信仰内涵与多民族跨区域佛教文化交流关系,均远胜莫高窟绝大多数西夏石窟。因东千佛洞石窟壁画风化现象极其严重,为图像辨识与研究造成很多困难,所以迄今为止即使围绕东千佛洞图像志研究和作品实例分析的成果已经非常丰硕,依然还有很多问题目前未能解决。本文通过详尽的实地调查和全面、高清的数字档案,再一次从整体上观察几个西夏洞窟,在图像辨识、图像志解析、内涵追索等方面获得了一些新思考。东千佛洞西夏壁画从河西本地固有造像传统的历史记忆中寻找依托,并且在10世纪末至11世纪初发起的佛教复兴大潮中利用天然的地理位置优势吸收各方文化精髓,对佛教图像体系进行创新、重组、重构,是西夏社会整体宗教信仰模式的生动体现。

The Tangut caves and murals preserved in Yulin and the East Thousand Buddha Grottoes in Guazhou are far superior to most of the Tangut artistic remains in Mogao Grottoes in terms of formal integrity,artistry,religious connotation behind the images and the relationship between multi-ethnic and cross-regional Buddhist cultural exchanges.Because the weathering of the murals in the East Thousand Buddha Cave is extremely serious,causing many difficulties in terms of image identification and research,even though the research on the image chronicles of the East Thousand Buddha Cave and the analysis of works examples have been very fruitful so far,there are still many problems that have not been solved.Through detailed field investigation and high-definition digital archives,this paper once again observes several Tangut caves as a whole and obtains some new interpretations in image identification,iconographic analysis,connotation understanding,etc.The Tangut murals of the Eastern Thousand Buddha Grottoes seek support from the historical memory of the local cultural tradition in Hexi region,and absorb the essence of various cultures by taking advantage of its natural geographical location in the Buddhist revival tide launched from the end of the 10th century to the beginning of the 11th century,and innovate,reorganize and reconstruct the Buddhist image system,which is a vivid reflection of the religious belief throughout Tangut society.