DgcityThe ninth Silk Road (Dunhuang) International Cultural Expo opened on Tuesday in the Gobi oasis of Dunhuang, drawing around 1,200 representatives from more than 50 countries and regions for three days of forums, exhibitions and performances. The event uses the pull of the Mogao Grottoes to argue that inter-civilisational exchange is not a luxury but an urgent practice.
The numbers behind Dunhuang justify the framing. The caves hold more than a thousand years of Buddhist art painted by travellers, monks and merchants moving between China, Central Asia, India and points farther west. The manuscript collections found in the region include texts in more than 40 languages and scripts, evidence of a place where trade, faith and artistic styles crossed freely.
This year’s programme ran across seven categories and 18 activities, from high-level meetings and performances to investment events and Silk Road cultural-tourism experiences. Exhibition halls displayed cultural and specialty products from participating countries, while VR stations let visitors take immersive tours inside caves that physical access cannot always accommodate, helping protect the fragile murals while widening their audience.
Speakers from UNESCO and the World Intellectual Property Organisation set the tone in different registers. One called for new models of exchange capable of touching hearts and bridging divides; the other pointed out that Dunhuang’s history itself shows how culture grows not in isolation but through contact, new ideas and creativity, an argument with direct implications for how traditional knowledge is shared and protected today.
The expo also functions at a smaller, commercial scale. Traders from across the region use it to expand sales and compare notes with counterparts from other countries, a reminder that the historical Silk Road was a network of merchants as much as pilgrims and diplomats. Since the first edition in 2016, the gathering has attracted close to 10,000 participants from more than 120 countries and regions.
Beyond the forum rooms, a quieter story runs through this year’s event: the photographers, conservators and digital technicians who now make up Dunhuang’s new generation of guardians. Their work, scanning murals pixel by pixel and rebuilding caves in virtual space, is the modern version of the exchange the expo celebrates, carrying a desert crossroads to audiences who may never stand in front of its walls.
