A Companion to Asian Art and Architecture
A Companion to Asian Art and Architecture

Author: Rebecca M. Brown

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2015-06-22

Total Pages: 691

ISBN-13: 1119019532

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A Companion to Asian Art and Architecture presents a collection of 26 original essays from top scholars in the field that explore and critically examine various aspects of Asian art and architectural history. Brings together top international scholars of Asian art and architecture Represents the current state of the field while highlighting the wide range of scholarly approaches to Asian Art Features work on Korea and Southeast Asia, two regions often overlooked in a field that is often defined as India-China-Japan Explores the influences on Asian art of global and colonial interactions and of the diasporic communities in the US and UK Showcases a wide range of topics including imperial commissions, ancient tombs, gardens, monastic spaces, performances, and pilgrimages.

Image Problems
Image Problems

Author: Robert Daniel DeCaroli

Publisher: University of Washington Press

Published: 2015-03-01

Total Pages: 274

ISBN-13: 029580579X

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This deft and lively study by Robert DeCaroli explores the questions of how and why the earliest verifiable images of the historical Buddha were created. In so doing, DeCaroli steps away from old questions of where and when to present the history of Buddhism’s relationship with figural art as an ongoing set of negotiations within the Buddhist community and in society at large. By comparing innovations in Brahmanical, Jain, and royal artistic practice, DeCaroli examines why no image of the Buddha was made until approximately five hundred years after his death and what changed in the centuries surrounding the start of the Common Era to suddenly make those images desirable and acceptable. The textual and archaeological sources reveal that figural likenesses held special importance in South Asia and were seen as having a significant amount of agency and power. Anxiety over image use extended well beyond the Buddhists, helping to explain why images of Vedic gods, Jain teachers, and political elites also are absent from the material record of the centuries BCE. DeCaroli shows how the emergence of powerful dynasties and rulers, who benefited from novel modes of visual authority, was at the root of the changes in attitude toward figural images. However, as DeCaroli demonstrates, a strain of unease with figural art persisted, even after a tradition of images of the Buddha had become established.

The Buddha Image
The Buddha Image

Author: Yuvraj Krishan

Publisher: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 176

ISBN-13: 9788121505659

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Illustrations: 247 b/w illustrations Description: This book deals with crucial though controversial questions in Buddhist art: the origin of the Buddha image and the iconography of the Buddha images. The earliest Buddhist art of Sanchi and Bharhut is aniconic : The Buddha is represented in symbols only. In the later Buddhist art of Gandhara and Mathura, the Buddha is represented in human form: he is the principal subject of sculptural art. The book seeks to explore the geographical area in which the image of the Buddha first emerged and whether the Buddhist doctrines-Hinayana or Mahayana-had anything to do with this transformation. The Buddha image, as developed eventually at Sarnath, became the model for the Buddha images in whole of Asia, south-east, central and eastern Asia. The iconographic features of the Buddha image are superficially an aberration, being in apparent conflict with the doctrine. The Buddha had cut off his hair at the time of his renunciation; the rules of the order enjoin that a monk must be tonsured and must discard and eschew all riches. However, in his images, the Buddha has hair on his head; later he is also endowed with a crown and jewels. After an exhaustive examination of the views of various scholars, the book answers these questions and resolves the controversies on the basis of literary, numismatic and epigraphic sources. More importantly it makes use of the valuable evidence from the contemporaneous Jaina art : Aniconism of early Jaina art and the iconographic features of Jaina images. The implications of this study are also important : Does India owe idolatry to Buddhism? Was this of foreign inspiration? Was the Buddha image fashioned after the Vedic Brahma and whether the Buddha's usnisa and Buddhist art motifs are rooted in the Vedic tradition? The book is profusely illustrated and provides rich and stimulating fare to students of Indian art in general and of Buddhist art in particular.

How to Read Buddhist Art
How to Read Buddhist Art

Author: Kurt Behrendt

Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art

Published: 2019-11-29

Total Pages: 139

ISBN-13: 1588396738

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Intended to inspire the devout and provide a focus for religious practice, Buddhist artworks stand at the center of a great religious tradition that swept across Asia during the first millennia. How to Read Buddhist Art assembles fifty-four masterpieces from The Met collection to explore how images of the Buddha crossed linguistic and cultural barriers, and how they took on different (yet remarkably consistent) characteristics in India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, the Himalayas, China, Korea, Japan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Cambodia, and Indonesia. Works highlighted in this rich, concise overview include reliquaries, images of the Buddha that attempt to capture his transcendence, diverse bodhisattvas who protect and help the devout on their personal path, and representations of important teachers. The book offers the essential iconographic frameworks needed to understand Buddhist art and practice, helping the reader to appreciate how artists gave form to subtle aspects of the teachings, especially in the sublime expression of the Buddha himself.

The Art of Buddhism
The Art of Buddhism

Author: Denise Patry Leidy

Publisher: Shambhala Publications

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 149

ISBN-13: 1590305949

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More than two hundred photographs-most in stunning full color-provide the visual context for this tour of the world of Buddhist art. From the earliest second-century b.c.e. archaeological evidence to the nineteenth century this book showcases the marvelous variety of Buddhist art through the ages, from every country and region where Buddhism has influenced the culture in a significant way, including India, Afghanistan, Central Asia, China, Korea, Japan, Tibet, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and all the regions of Southeast Asia. Included in the rich variety of forms are architecture and monumental art, statuary, paintings, calligraphy, fresco, brushwork, and textile arts.

Absence of the Buddha Image in Early Buddhist Art
Absence of the Buddha Image in Early Buddhist Art

Author: Kanoko Tanaka

Publisher:

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 284

ISBN-13:

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Dr. Tanaka, For The First Time Ever, Explores The Absence Of The Buddha-Image In Early Buddhist Art. Applying The Motif Of The Empty Throne , She Undertakes A Comparative Study Of Buddhism And Other Religions.

Becoming the Buddha
Becoming the Buddha

Author: Donald K. Swearer

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2020-07-21

Total Pages: 351

ISBN-13: 0691216029

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Becoming the Buddha is the first book-length study of a key ritual of Buddhist practice in Asia: the consecration of a Buddha image or "new Buddha," a ceremony by which the Buddha becomes present or alive. Through a richly detailed, accessible exploration of this ritual in northern Thailand, an exploration that stands apart from standard text-based or anthropological approaches, Donald Swearer makes a major contribution to our understanding of the Buddha image, its role in Buddhist devotional life, and its relationship to the veneration of Buddha relics. Blending ethnography, analysis, and Buddhist texts related to this mimetic reenactment of the night of the Buddha's enlightenment, he demonstrates that the image becomes the Buddha's surrogate by being invested with the Buddha's story and charged with the extraordinary power of Buddhahood. The process by which this transformation occurs through chant, sermon, meditation, and the presence of charismatic monks is at the heart of this book. Known as "opening the eyes of the Buddha," image consecration traditions throughout Buddhist Asia share much in common. Within the cultural context of northern Thailand, Becoming the Buddha illuminates scriptural accounts of the making of the first Buddha image; looks at debates over the ritual's historical origin, at Buddhological insights achieved, and at the hermeneutics of absence and presence; and provides a thematic comparison of several Buddhist traditions.