The Tang Dynasty Arts Museum is the first dynastic museum
in China. Situated in the Qujiang Scenic Spot, it is built with invest-
ments from both china and Japan.
The museum covers a whole area of 2,910 square metres, of
which 983 square metres are used for display. The museum is char-
acterized by its typical Tang-style courtyard architecture.
The Tang Dynasty Arts Museum consists of six exhibition
rooms. With latest archaeological discoveries, significant historic
relics and detailed written literature, the four show rooms of
Chang'an--the capital of the Tang Dynasty, Chinese customs and
habits, Tang poems and calligraphy, and sculpture and paintings
prominently reflect the magnificent art achievements at the height
of the Tang Dynasty and provide a good place for the study, and
appreciation of the Tang Dynasty arts.
The first exhibition room concentrates on Chang'an--the
capital of the Tang Dynasty, which reflects the Tang-style architec-
ture characterized by the Tang Chang'an City with a large number
of exquisite building materials and architectural models. What is the
most spectacular is the restoration model of Linde Hall in Daming
Palace (the Hall of Supreme Virtue in the Palace of Supreme Wis-
dom)in Chang'an City of the Tang Dynasty, which is made by
Yang Hongxun,a research fellow in the Archaeological Research In-
stitute, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.
The second exhibition room is about Chinese customs and
habits. It is divided in a number of divisions of music and dancing,
pottery and porcelain, dress and adornment, games, silk products,
tableware, currency, bronze mirrors, gold and silver wares. This
exhibition room provides vivid materials for the understanding of the
social style and features of the Tang Dynasty. It was recorded that
there were more than 30,000 envoys and merchants from border-
lands and foreign countries living in Chang'an and it was fashionable
for the Hans to wear Hun's hats and the Huns to wear Han's caps.
The third showroom is about Tang poems and calligraphy,
which depicts the important position of the Tang poems and callig-
raphy in Chinese culture. The showroom provides a good place for
learning and appreciating schools of the Tang poems and their repre-
sentatives and the different styles of calligraphy and their represen-
tatives.
The fourth exhibition room mainly contains sculptures and
paintings, which describes the great achievements in sculptures and
paintings of the Tang Dynasty and show the artistic features of the
Tang sculptures. They are really eye-openers. The Tang-dynasty
sculpture formed its own style ; vigorous, robust, elegant and expres-
sive, instead of the "delicate and slim" style of the North and South
Dynasty. Here also are exhibited some pottery maids, who look
pretty, plump and care-free. Thus the females in the opening era
were carved vivid and life-like. The subject matter of the Tang
paintings is human figures. Wu Daozi, the so called "genius
painter" is a representative of this school. He is well-known all over
China for his line drawings. Besides, landscapes were becoming
more poi~ular during the Tang Dynasty. The representatives are Li
Sixun and his son, Wang Wei, Zhang Zao and so on. The paintings
of flowers and birds, line carvings, and frescoes advanced greatly
during the Tang Dynasty.