The 1986 excavation of the Sanxingdui (Tri-star Piles) in China has aroused archeological interests with the discoveries of a large number of bronze statues and masks produced with very sophisticated technology in a style very different from the Yellow River basin. Among them, a huge standing bronze statue weighs over 396 lbs (180 kilograms) and thus required the smelting of more than 22,046 lbs (10,000 kilograms) of ore. Dr. Dominic Cheung will trace and link Sanxingdui to a separate culture of an ancient Shu Kingdom in Szechuan (parallel to the Shang-Zhou Dynasties in China's central regions in Henan) where the kingdom had achieved a high degree of sophistication in bronze working, and had its own unique art and burial culture. Sponsored by the Medellas Foundation.

Dr. Dominic Cheung is Professor of Chinese and Comparative Literature at the University of Southern California. He is a renowned modern Chinese poet and an art critic with books written on Chinese bronze, porcelain, and paintings.