[2] The Buddhist art of Central Asia, particularly the area of Afghanistan, in the 7th-8th century CE shows a phase using "Sinicized Indian models".

[5] This style is part of a cosmopolitan artistic idiom which spread from China to Central Asia at the time, with similarities visible for example in the Tang productions of Tianlongshan.

[3] In particular, the publication by Japanese art dealer Yamanaka Sadajirō of a book on the caves' contents led to a sharp increase in collector interest.

[2] The Tianlongshan Grottoes exist today in a damaged state in Taiyuan with so many of the sculptures now missing, that visitors to the caves cannot imagine how they looked in the past.

The Project seeks to record and archive the sculptures and to compile data that can identify the fragments and their places of origin.