Terra-cotta

The faces of the jambs and archivolts of these openings are heavily adorned with mouldings and foliate ornaments in terra-cotta relief, while the archivolts of the arcade above have more simple neo-classic profiling, and more refined and conventional foliate ornamentation.

As Gateja explains to some people who have came to see his work, the cloth comes from the inner bark of a ficus tree. It is harvested during the wet season and then, in a long process, beaten with different types of wooden mallets to make its texture soft, fine and give it an even terra-cotta color.

More than 2,000 years old, this statue is one of the clay cavalrymen who once guarded the tomb of China's first emperor, Qin Shihuangdi. The warrior and his horse now stand at the entrance to the National Geographic Museum in Washington, and are among the largest number of Chinese terra-cotta figures ever to travel to the United States.

We began the trip at the ancient capital of Xi'an, where the Chinese put on an elaborate and beautiful welcoming ceremony. The next day we had the opportunity to walk among the rows of the famous terra-cotta warriors, and to have a roundtable discussion with Chinese citizens in the small village of Xiahe.