A mural in the Mogao Grottoes of Dunhuang features a monk seemingly mimicking the signature pose of Marilyn Monroe.

A mural featuring a monk seemingly mimicking the signature pose of Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch has managed to amuse Chinese netizens and even stirred up a new appetite for parodying the ancient paintings in the Mogao Grottoes of Dunhuang. But the developments have upset scholars, who are unhappy with the public's superficial take on Buddhist art.

Preserved in cave 468 of the world's largest Buddhist grottoes, in Gansu province, the mural in question didn't attract any attention until Chen Shiyu, a cultural magazine editor, photographed it and uploaded the picture onto douban.com. The caption read: "Afraid of being scolded by his teacher, the monk turns as bashful as Monroe."

Thousands of netizens have forwarded the picture since Chen posted it, adding an album title, "the Unexplainable Dunhuang", along with a photo of Marilyn Monroe's famous pose, to highlight the similarities.

"People used to think that Dunhuang was all about glamorous Buddha statues and delicate frescoes, but if you look at other parts of Dunhuang, there's lots of fun," Chen said.

On March 31, another post featuring the Dunhuang murals was uploaded to tianya.com, an online forum, and again was forwarded widely. The fresco, featuring a man going to the toilet, reveals what netizens call "the vulgar side" of Dunhuang.

Vulgar or divine?

The art of the Dunhuang grottoes is trending widely on the Internet in China, but scholars and Buddhists alike have mixed feelings. Although Dunhuang, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is one of China's most popular tourist destinations, few Chinese people are familiar with the archeological and artistic significance of its ancient paintings, they say. In fact, the Mogao Grottoes were never widely discussed on the Internet before the so-called "Monroe parody" was discovered.

For Zhao Shengliang, a senior researcher at Dunhuang Academy, however, the "Monroe parody" has completely missed the point.