Elzati Eshantol, 23, born and raised in the county, just graduated from the Institute of Fine Arts of the Xinjiang Normal University. He learned to sing about Manas from his parents, who also named his younger brother after a hero from the lore. "Every Kirgiz regards Manas as a role model, a cultural icon," he says.

He was there when the first Manas International Cultural Tourism Festival was held in 2007. More than 500 villagers came together to sing paeans to the warrior while cultural troupes performed scenes from the epic.

Once his understanding of the folklore deepened, Elzati started making illustrations for posterity. Now quite adept in sketching characters and scenes from the epic, he can condense a complex plot into a single painting.

Elzati's graduation project was a book of paintings about his favorite chapter from the Epic of Manas－the story about the hero's first battle. "The epic is indeed very long, and I have only been able to illustrate a fraction of its content. I want to keep making illustrations so that the epic reaches more people. Images can offer a much better understanding of the Kirgiz folklore," he says.

Mao Weihua in Urumqi contributed to this story.

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