Japan Exhibit: Artists from Japan, South Korea team up for Buddhist statue exhibition in Nara (until 21 July)

Asahi Shimbun
KAZUTO TSUKAMOTO
12 July 2014

A Miroku-bosatsu Buddhist statue is surrounded by toy deer in the Nara Prefectural Museum of Art in Nara. (Kazuto Tsukamoto)

NARA–A Japanese artist and his South Korean counterpart have joined forces to show how Buddhist culture was brought to Japan through the Korean Peninsula with a special exhibition featuring “Miroku-bosatsu” Buddhist statues.

The work of 53-year-old sculptor Takashi Kikuchi and artist Park Dong-ki, 47, is currently on display at the Nara Prefectural Museum of Art.

Kikuchi has held exhibitions of contemporary art and photos in Japan and South Korea after forming a group of artists from the two countries called “Forest-Beyond.”

Kikuchi carved three 1.3-meter-tall styrene figures and covered them with red, yellow and orange wool.

Saudi Arabian student vandalizes temple statues

NHK World
Jun. 11, 2014

A Saudi Arabian man has been arrested for vandalizing Buddhist statues at a temple in downtown Tokyo.

Police say they received an emergency call about a foreigner behaved violently at the Sensoji Temple in Asakusa, Taito Ward at around midnight on Wednesday.

They say officers who rushed to the scene found 4 Buddhist statues lying broken on the ground.

Photo essay: Glimpse of Longmen Grottoes

People’s Daily Online
June 18, 2014

Located in central China’s Henan Province, the Longmen Grottoes is a World Cultural Heritage recognized by UNESCO in 2000. The stone carvings in Longmen Grottoes were started from the reign of Emperor Xiaowen of North Wei Dynasty (471-477) and lasted over 400 years to complete.

Representing the highest stone-carving level of China, the Longmen Grottoes stretches about 1 kilometer from south to north, with over 1,300 grottoes, 2,345 shrines, over 3,600 inscriptions, over 50 pagodas and over 97,000 Buddha statues. It is not only a stone-carving art museum, but also an encyclopedia of history and culture.

For more photos, follow the [link].

TV: Buddhist Statues: Figures of belief & beauty

 

A giant Buddha statue is unveiled in Bangladesh

Buddhistdoor International BD Dipananda 2014-05-29

A new buddha statue in East Idalpur Buddhist Temple. From Dhammainfo.

Recently, when an initiative to erect a 10-foot Buddha statue at the Ajalcuga Forest Temple in Rangamati district of Bangladesh was raised, there was strong opposition from the local state forces and administration. The district administration imposed 144 prohibitive rules indefinitely and claimed these areas in protected forests were out of bounds for building any kind of settlement. At the same time, there was an attempt at depriving the Buddhists and some indigenous organizations in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of their right to build religious structures on their land.

Seven gilded Buddhist deity stolen from Erdenezuu Museum

Ulan Bator Post
By M.ZOLJARGAL
20 May 2014

Seven gilded Buddhist deity and several other religious artifacts were stolen on Monday night from the Museum of Erdenezuu Monastery in Kharkhorin soum of Uvurkhangai Province.

Police inspectors, inspection agencies, and the Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism are currently working at the museum after receiving a report from the General Police Department.

Erdenezuu Museum has an alarm installed at every glass display and a 24/7 security guards, reported officials.

Three of the deity are masterpieces of finest handicrafts dating back to the 17th century and are considered unparalleled artifacts of Mongolia.

A source from the museum said, “Gilded Manjusri, Duinhor, Jugdernamjil and four gilded Maitreya were stolen. We are not sure how the thieves sneaked through and got out of the museum without being noticed by the guards.”

All law enforcement organizations including border and customs departments were notified of the case, and are working to find the stolen artifacts.

[link]

Photo essay: Facial mask for centuries-old Goddess: restoring project

People’s Daily Online
May 08, 2014

Specialists put several “facial masks” on a Thousand-hand Buddhist Goddess of Mercy statue on Baoding Mountain in Southwest China’s Chongqing municipality on May 7, 2014. (Photo/ Luo Guojia)

Specialists applied “facial masks” on the statue of a Thousand-hand Buddhist Goddess of Mercy on Baoding Mountain in Southwest China’s Chongqing municipality on May 7, 2014. The demineralization “facial mask” is made of multi-layered tissue paper soaked in pure water. Specialists pat tissue onto the statue gently, remove it till it dry out and repeat applying masks for two to three times.

The statue, one integral part of the Dazu Rock Carvings, which are designated as a World Heritage Site, was originally carved in the Song Dynasty (960-1279). The conservation project was initially launched on April 18, 2011 and is expected to be completed in the first half of 2015. 

For more photos, follow the [link].

India stone-faced on US offer to return stolen Buddhist idols

Times of India
Kirit Mankodi
29 April 2014

2012 Photo: http://www.ice.gov/news/releases/1212/121205newyork.htm

The US immigration and customs department (ICE/DHS) has seized $100-million worth antiquities from Subhash Kapoor who is undergoing trial in Tamil Nadu for stealing idols from a temple in Ariyalur. These antiquities were allegedly smuggled from many states in India and other Asian countries and recovered in raids on Kapoor’s business in New York called Art of the Past.

ICE is keen to return the items but has been unable to find a matching interest on the part of Indian authorities. For instance, among the antique pieces, is a Chola-era stone sculpture of Buddha, likely stolen from Tamil Nadu. Another is a Bharhut Yakshi – worth $15 million in the art market and the most expensive item so far found in the Kapoor catalogue — stolen from a shrine in Madhya Pradesh.

“A monumental [exhibit] in about every sense of the word.”

WSJ
LEE LAWRENCE
April 15, 2014

Krishna Govardhana, from seventh-century southern Cambodia National Museum of Cambodia, Phnom Penh

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “Lost Kingdoms: Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture of Early Southeast Asia” is a monumental show in about every sense of the word. At least one third of its 150-plus works are large sculptures and reliefs. Almost 100 pieces traveled from institutions across Southeast Asia. And the show’s very concept reflects new findings and directions in scholarship. The result is a show with as much to attract specialists—from inscriptions on first-time loans from Myanmar or the earliest-known statue of Vishnu from southern Cambodia—as there is to delight art lovers generally.

The works range from a toothy, monstrous figure looking down from a lintel (mid-seventh-century central Cambodia) to a majestic bodhisattva made slightly later in southern Vietnam. And nothing beats the beauty and animation of an early seventh-century life-size statue from southern Cambodia depicting the Hindu god Krishna looking most pleased with himself as, the story goes, he holds a mountain up and out of reach of a rival god’s wrath. Nearby, a Vishnu from central Thailand (late sixth to seventh century) offers a serious, warriorlike counterpoint. Broad-shouldered and muscular, he appears as strong and dependable as the rock from which he is hewn.

Lost Kingdoms:  Hindu-Buddhist Sculpture Of Early Southeast Asia, 5th to 8th Century
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Through July 27

NY Exhibit: Early Chinese Buddhist sculptures

Wall Street International
10 April 2014

6 March – 26 April 2014 at Throckmorton Fine Art, New York

China, Head of a Bodhisattva, Eastern Wei Period / Northern Qi Period, 535-577 CE, Marble, Height: 13 1/4 inches, Cat#8

Throckmorton Fine Art is pleased to offer an exhibit of thirty-one, early Chinese Buddhist sculptures. These works of art are rare survivors of Buddhist purges in the past; many were buried for centuries. They have been carefully cleaned, revealing their sublime beauty and refined elegance. Each piece has been carefully studied by Chinese scholars, with photographs and analyses included in an accompanying catalogue prepared under the guidance of Dr. Qing Chang and Dr. Elizabeth Childs-Johnson.