A small bronze mirror from the Cincinnati Art Museum, dating from the 15th or 16th century, seemed unremarkable to museum curators.
It last exhibited in 2017, and has spent much of the previous decades in storage, sitting on a shelf in the back room along with other objects excluded from public display.
But the artifact had a secret hidden from people.
While examining the so-called “magic mirrors” – rare ancient mirrors that, under certain lighting, reveal images or patterns on opposite walls – the curator of the Museum of East Asian Art, Hou-mei Sun, saw something resembling examples from Edo-era Japan.
The item kept in Cincinnati, Ohio, was smaller than those kept in museums in Tokyo, Shanghai and New York. It also featured a more complex style of Chinese writing. However, Song recalled that there was something “very similar” about it.
So, last spring, she visited the museum vaults, accompanied by a conservation expert.
“I asked her to shine a bright, focused light on the mirror,” Sun said. All it took was a flashlight on a mobile phone.
There was texture on the wall in front of them in the reflected light, a fuzzy image, but sufficient for further study. After experimenting with more powerful and focused light sources, a Buddha image eventually appeared in the mirror, beams of light coming from it. Another man was sitting next to him. The inscription on the back of the mirror spoke of who was depicted: Amitabha, an important figure in various schools of East Asian Buddhism.