Central Asian dancers captured in motion on Tang Dynasty tomb doors

Look closely at the figures carved into the stone doors and you can recognize they are male dancers performing the Whirl Dance, a dynamic Central Asian dance introduced via the Silk Road that gained widespread popularity in Tang Dynasty (618-907) China.

Each door features a strong and vividly detailed Central Asian dance performer: curly hair, deep-set eyes, a prominent nose, dressed in a snug shirt and tight skirts, wearing tall leather boots and dancing on a finely woven round rug. They are surrounded by cloud motifs, as if spinning through the sky.

Discovered in 1985 in a Tang tomb in Yanchi county, Ningxia, the stone doors are evidence of how cultural exchange flourished along the Silk Road. Currently, they are housed at Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region Museum.