Buddhist Art: The Later Tradition

Hanging scrolls with magnificent calligraphy, shimmering gilded statues, ritual objects and a natural installation of beautifully eroded soft gray limestone greet visitors on the second-floor galleries of the Arthur M. Sackler Museum.

“Buddhist Art: The Later Tradition” surveys the transmission of Buddhism throughout Southeast Asia and documents developments in Buddhist iconography. A variety of objects from China, Korea, Japan, Tibet and India provides a comprehensive view of Buddhist art from the 10th through 18th centuries.

The exhibit, on display until Sept. 7, features 72 works of East Asian Buddhist art with strikingly uniform subject matter. “We aimed to present a comprehensive overview of Buddhist art from China, Korea and Japan over a period of one thousand years,” said the exhibit’s curator, Alan J. Dworsky Curator of Chinese Art Robert D. Mowry.

A vast majority of the objects in the exhibit come from Harvard University Art Museums permanent collection, among them several recent acquisitions. Several other works are on loan from private collections.

The exhibit displays a variety of fascinating objects that provide insight into Buddhist beliefs, practices and developments. Chinese, Korean and Japanese hanging scrolls illustrate and record Buddhist “sutras,” or sacred texts. Ceremonial objects such as Chinese censers and Tibetan bell handles bring to mind images of traditional Buddhist ceremonies. Wooden and brass statues, as well as several scroll paintings, depict frightening monsters who serve as protector deities that ward off demons.

The exhibit even gives visitors a glimpse of a traditional Chinese garden courtesy of its “Garden Rocks” installation, a unique set of eroded gray limestone rocks and plants that receives both natural and artificial light. This magnificent Ming Dynasty formation, set off from the rest of the exhibition in its own recessed niche, spiritually thrusts upwards toward the open sky.

The exhibit’s informal centerpiece consists of four monumental hanging scroll paintings that depict “The Kings of Hell.” In the Buddhist tradition, the Kings of Hell controlled the fate of the dead, judging good and bad deeds and meting out horrific punishments. The scroll paintings – from China, Korea, and Japan – present these scenes of the underworld in similar fashions, evidence of a strict adherence to iconographic convention throughout East Asia. “I hope the viewer realizes that Buddhist subject matter remains the same in Asian countries over a period of time, despite changes in style over the centuries,” Mowry said.

Mowry’s favorite piece in the show is a 14th century Korean scroll painting of a bodhisattva (an enlightened being who has chosen to help others attain enlightenment rather than reach nirvana himself), cloaked by thin veils of diaphanous silk. “The work is extraordinarily well painted and well preserved,” he said.

The sacred Buddhist sutras constitute a large portion of the exhibit’s works. Many of the sutra chapters include illustrations that accompany the calligraphic text. Beautifully detailed woodblock prints, both inked and touched up with gold pigment, make up the magnificent pages of the sutras. The copying of such texts was vital to the transmission of Buddhist beliefs and practices. Furthermore, it was considered a meritorious act that brought good fortune to both the patron who commissioned the work and the artist himself.

The three small galleries both explore developments in Buddhism and survey its transmission in East Asia from the 10th through 18th centuries. The three rooms chart Buddhism’s progress chronologically, with each room presenting a wide variety of objects – scroll paintings, wooden and bronze statuary, ceramics, ritual objects and figurines. “I hope visitors see the evolution of Buddhist iconographic types and regional and national styles,” said Mowry.

“Buddhist Art: The Later Tradition” effectively demonstrates that Buddhist iconographic conventions remained essentially the same from one country to the next over several centuries. Said Mowry, “I wanted to make sure the objects worked well together both intellectually and visually.” And, indeed, the exhibit’s visual variety and geographical diversity provides both aesthetic pleasure and insight into the history of Buddhism.