On any of the roads entering Tibet from the neighbouring provinces of Sichuan and Qinghai, trucks covered in brightly coloured canopies and stone houses sporting the same coloured curtains over the doors can be seen. They stand out against the blue sky and grey mountains.
These fabrics could be another Tibetan custom or religious symbol, but they are actually the work of painter Xiong Wenyun. She made them to preserve the unique culture and fragile environment of ethnic Tibetan regions.
A Chongqing native, Xiong was sent for 're-education' as a middle school student during the Cultural Revolution. She went to Aba, a Tibetan prefecture in western Sichuan province. She left after China's 10-year political turmoil ended in 1976 to learn painting, first in Chongqing, then in Japan.
When she returned to Tibet in 1998 as a painter, Xiong, now 45, was so overwhelmed by the rough but beautiful terrain that she began to create behaviour art along the Sichuan-Tibet road.
She painted the ends of logs red and yellow, decorated roadside houses with curtains and covered the trucks with canopies.
To her surprise, locals appreciated her art for practical reasons. Many drivers bought canopies because the cheerful colours made them more visible, helping to prevent accidents. But more local people understood she was trying to highlight the deteriorating environment.
They approached her to complain about mounting rubbish and the rampant logging of natural forests. She said one local told her 'the woods are bleeding' upon seeing red-painted logs. As a one-time resident, Xiong also felt sad to see the changes brought by roads and economic development. In western Sichuan and eastern Tibet, much of the natural forest was felled when roads went in.