Treasures Rediscovered focuses on a group of 22 stone devotional objects and architectural fragments that collectively represent major developments in Chinese religion and mortuary culture, from the Han (206 BCED220 CE) through the Tang dynasty (618D907). The major emphasis is on works from the sixth century, a period of great intellectual ferment and artistic transformation, above all in the Buddhist arts. The sculptures included range from a small personal votive icon to large temple carvings. The majority are Buddhist icons in various formats, objects of devotion that were installed in temples and cave chapels. Leopold Swergold is a trustee of the Freer and Sackler Galleries of the Smithsonian Institution. Other contributors are Eileen Hsiang-ling Hsu, Stanley K. Abe, Wendi Leigh Adamek, Dorothy C. Wong, Annette L. Juliano, Cary Y. Liu, Elinor Pearlstein, and Diana P. Rowan."

Literati painting, or bunjinga, flourished in Japan after its early 18th-century introduction from China. This book magnificently illustrates and examines an important collection of literati and shin nanga artworks, including outstanding examples of paintings, calligraphy, and ceramics. Paul Berry is an independent scholar specializing in Japanese painting. Michiyo Morioka is an independent scholar of Japanese art with expertise in nihonga and gender issues in modern Japanese art.

Until now, the notion of a cross-cultural dialogue has not figured in the analysis of harem paintings, largely because the Western fantasy of the harem has been seen as the archetype for Western appropriation of the Orient. In Intimate Outsiders, the art historian Mary Roberts brings to light a body of harem imagery that was created through a dynamic process of cultural exchange. Roberts focuses on images produced by nineteenth-century European artists and writers who were granted access to harems in the urban centers of Istanbul and Cairo. As invited guests, these Europeans were "intimate outsiders" within the women's quarters of elite Ottoman households. At the same time, elite Ottoman women were offered intimate access to European culture through their contact with these foreign travelers.Roberts draws on a range of sources, including paintings, photographs, and travelogues discovered in archives in Britain, Turkey, Egypt, and Denmark. She rethinks the influential harem works of the realist painter John Frederick Lewis, a British artist living in Cairo during the 1840s, whose works were granted an authoritative status by his British public despite the actual limits of his insider knowledge. Unlike Lewis, British women were able to visit Ottoman harems, and from the mid-nineteenth century on they did so in droves. Writing about their experiences in published travelogues, they undermined the idea that harems were the subject only of male fantasies. The elite Ottoman women who orchestrated these visits often challenged their guests' misapprehensions about harem life, and a number of them exercised power as patrons, commissioning portraits from European artists. Their roles as art patrons defy the Western idea of the harem woman as passive odalisque.

Gods in the Bazaar is a fascinating account of the printed images known in India as "calendar art" or "bazaar art," the color-saturated, mass-produced pictures often used on calendars and in advertisements, featuring deities and other religious themes as well as nationalist leaders, alluring women, movie stars, chubby babies, and landscapes. Calendar art appears in all manner of contexts in India: in chic elite living rooms, middle-class kitchens, urban slums, village huts; hung on walls, stuck on scooters and computers, propped up on machines, affixed to dashboards, tucked into wallets and lockets. In this beautifully illustrated book, Kajri Jain examines the power that calendar art wields in Indian mass culture, arguing that its meanings derive as much from the production and circulation of the images as from their visual features. Jain draws on interviews with artists, printers, publishers, and consumers as well as analyses of the prints themselves to trace the economies-of art, commerce, religion, and desire-within which calendar images and ideas about them are formulated. For Jain, an analysis of the bazaar, or vernacular commercial arena, is crucial to understanding not only the calendar art that circulates within the bazaar but also India's postcolonial modernity and the ways that its mass culture has developed in close connection with a religiously inflected nationalism. The bazaar is characterized by the coexistence of seemingly incompatible elements: bourgeois-liberal and neoliberal modernism on the one hand, and vernacular discourses and practices on the other. Jain argues that from the colonial era to the present, capitalist expansion has depended on the maintenance of these multiple coexisting realms: the sacred, the commercial, and the artistic; the official and the vernacular.

Is there something unique about Islamic art? This book argues that there is not -- that Islam does not play an leading role in the aesthetic judgements that we should make about objects created in the Islamic world. It is often argued that a very special sort of consciousness went into creating Islamic art, that it is very different from other forms of art, that Muslims are not allowed to portray human beings in their art, and that calligraphy is the supreme Islamic art form. Oliver Leaman challenges all these ideas, showing them to be misguided. Instead he suggests that the sort of criteria we should apply to Islamic art are identical to the criteria applicable to art in general, and that the attempt to put Islamic art into a special category is a result of orientalism Key Features: *Criticises the influence of Sufism on Islamic aesthetics *Deals with issues arising in painting, calligraphy, architecture, gardens, literature, films, and music *Pays close attention to the Qur'an *Argument includes examples from history, art, philosophy, theology and the artefacts of the Islamic world The reader is invited to view Islamic art as no more and no less than ordinary art, neither better nor worse than anything else that counts as art. It follows that there are no special techniques required in Islamic aesthetics as compared with any other form of aesthetics.

This text looks at the role of art in the Indian subcontinent and then analyzes early art from the Indus civilization (2000 BC) to the time of Buddha (c.5000 BC). The Mauryan emperor Ashoka (4th century BC), was an important player in the dissemination of Buddhism, using art to this end. A stable economic base and the rise of a mercantile community were important in Buddhism's growth. Inscriptions show that the contributions to pay for art came from housewives, householders, merchants, traders and a range of other common people. The vibrant narrative tradition displayed in this art is analyzed.

Caring for Japanese Art at the Chester Beatty Library is a memoir of Yoshiko Ushioda , looking back at more than five decades of life in Dublin. The story begins in 1960, when she traveled from Tokyo with her young son to join her husband, a research-fellow at University College Dublin. Beginning as a volunteer at the Chester Beatty Library in 1970, she would go on to become curator and accompany masterpieces loaned by The Chester Beatty Library to special exhibitions all around the world. Both inspiring and heartfelt, Mrs. Ushioda's memoir will be of interest to both lovers of Japanese Art and those interested in Irish-Japanese relations.

For centuries ceramics have been a central feature of Chinese art and culture. They were employed in everyday life and served as both ritualistic and funerary objects. Dr Heribert Meurer's pre-eminent collection of 174 high-quality pieces dating from 1050 BCE to AD 1280 - which up until now has remained unpublished - offers an impressive panorama of the artefacts' roles, as well as the vessel forms and techniques of early Chinese ceramic art, complemented by over 30 objects from the GRASSI Museum Leipzig, where the collection was endowed in 2017. The focal points of the collection are the ceramics of the Tang and Song dynasties. Examples of the popular Sancai (tricolour) lead glaze, Celadon porcelain from Yueyao, Yaozhou and Longquan and Changsha ware, so-called Jian black porcelain from Jianyang Prefecture and Quingbai ware from the southern kiln sites of the Song era illustrate the wealth, diversity, high quality and exceptional appeal of early Chinese ceramics. Text in German.

Die Autorin befasst sich mit dem Wirken von Vladimir Boudnik (1924 - 1968), der zu den bedeutendsten tschechischen Kunstlern der zweiten Halfte des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts gehoert. Mit seinen eigenen grafischen Verfahren, der aktiven, strukturellen und magnetischen Grafik, nahm er einen enormen Einfluss auf die Nachkriegskunst in der damaligen Tschechoslowakei. In dem kommunistischen Land stellte er sich mit seinem kunstlerischen Ausdruck gegen dem proklamierten Sozialistischen Realismus. Fast sein gesamtes Leben lang war er als Kunstler im Untergrund tatig und arbeitete als Arbeiter in einer Fabrik. Erst im Zusammenhang mit dem Prager Fruhling wurde er offiziell als Kunstler anerkannt. Nach dem Einmarsch der Soldaten des Warschauer Paktes sollte sein Name jedoch wieder fast komplett in Vergessenheit geraten.

A unique and visionary generation of young Chinese artists are coming to prominence in the art world - just as China cements its place as the second largest art market on the planet. Building on the new frontiers opened up by the Chinese artists of the late 1980s and 1990s, artists such as Ai Wei Wei who came to the West and became household names, this new generation are provocative, exciting and bold. But what does it mean to be a Chinese artist today? And how can we better understand their work? Here, renowned critic Barbara Pollack presents the first book to tell the story of how these Chinese millennials, fast becoming global art superstars, negotiate their cultural heritage, and what this means for China's impact on the future of global culture. Many young Chinese artists have declared they are "not Chinese, but global" - this book investigates just what that means for China, the art market, and the world. Brand new Art from China is the first collection to showcase the dynamic new art coming from Chinese artists, and features full-colour photos and video stills throughout - with many works being published in book-form for the first time. Featuring an in-depth interview with Zhang Xiaogang, probably the most well-known artist in China itself, whose sombre portraits of Chinese families during the Cultural Revolution sell for as much as $12 million at auction, alongside unparalleled access to the tastemakers of today's art scene, Brand New Art from China is the essential guide to Chinese contemporary art today - its vision, values and aesthetics.

The principal aspects of Zen painting and the sumi-e method are explained in this book with a simple and poetic language. The materials used in this method of painting, such as solid ink, stone ink pots, bamboo brushes, and cloth paper, are explained in detail, as are the brushstrokes and techniques specific to each of the four noblemen--the bamboo, the prune, the chrysanthemum, and the wild orchid--with the goal of finding the way to creative expression. Los aspectos principales de la pintura zen y del metodo sumi-e surgen de un lenguaje sencillo y poetico en este libro. Los materiales utilizados como la tinta solida, tinteros de piedra, pinceles de bambu y papeles de fibras se describen detalladamente en esta guia, la cual tambien ensena las diferentes pinceladas y tecnicas particulares de los cuatro honorables caballeros: el bambu, el ciruelo, el crisantemo y la orquidea silvestre, con la noble finalidad de encontrar un camino para expresar la creatividad.

This visually stunning book focuses on the rebirth of Chinese art in the twentieth century under the influence of Western art and culture. Michael Sullivan, recognized throughout the world as a leading scholar of Chinese art, vividly documents the conflicting pulls of traditional and Western values on Chinese art and provides 364 illustrations, in color and black-and-white, to show the great range of artistic expression and the historical processes that occurred within various movements. A substantial biographical index of twentieth-century Chinese artists is a valuable addition to the text. Sullivan discusses artists and their work against China's background of oppression and relaxation, despair and hope. He expertly conveys the diverse and at times bizarre intertwining of Chinese cultural history and art during this century. Included are the intense debates between traditionalists and reformers, the creation of the first art schools, and the birth of the idea - shocking in ethnocentric China - that art is a world language that obliterates all frontiers. The scholarly traditions of classical Chinese painting, the belated discovery of Western modernism, the artistic upheaval under Communism, and China's rethinking of the very nature of art all have a place in Sullivan's fascinating history. Michael Sullivan has known many of the major figures in China's modern art movement of the 1930s and 1940s and has also gained the confidence of younger artists who rose to prominence following the 1979 'Peking Spring'. This long-awaited book - richly documented and abundantly illustrated - is a capstone to Sullivan's work and will be enthusiastically welcomed by art lovers everywhere.

The sophistication and variety of painting in Japan's Edo period, as seen through a preeminent US collection Over more than four decades, Robert and Betsy Feinberg have assembled the finest private collection of Edo-period Japanese painting in the United States. The collection is notable for its size, its remarkable quality, and its comprehensiveness. It represents virtually every stylistic lineage of the Edo-period (1615-1868)-from the gorgeous decorative works of the Rinpa school to the luminous clarity of the Maruyama-Shijo school, from the "pictures of the floating world" (ukiyo-e) to the inky innovations of the so-called eccentrics-in addition to sculpture from the medieval and early modern periods. Hanging scrolls, folding screens, handscrolls, albums, and fan paintings: the objects are as breathtaking as they are varied. This catalogue's 12 contributors, including established names in the field alongside emerging voices, use the latest scholarship to offer sensitive close readings that bring these remarkable works to life. Distributed for the Harvard Art Museums

Cet ouvrage a recu le 32eme prix de la Society for the Study of Japonisme de Tokyo. Pour illustrer l'interet que l'art japonais suscita aupres des artistes occidentaux du XIXe siecle, le cas de Giuseppe De Nittis (1846-1884), peintre italien installe a Paris en 1868, est exemplaire. Devenu un artiste a succes, De Nittis fit son entree dans les milieux artistiques et intellectuels. Son salon devint un des endroits les plus celebres de la ville. Parmi ses convives, on comptait les majeurs collectionneurs d'art japonais de l'epoque. Les precieux renseignements recuperes dans des documents inedits ont permis de reconstituer le cadre japonisant ou De Nittis avait vecu et de remonter aux objets orientaux dont il aimait s'entourer et d'ou il puisa son inspiration. L'ouvrage conduit a une demonstration claire des relations entre japonisme et naturalisme chez De Nittis. C'est la premiere fois que De Nittis japonisant apparait sous un eclairage novateur et insoupconne. Base sur des recherches rigoureuses et nouvelles, ce livre apporte egalement des precisions passionnantes sur la diffusion d'objets japonais aupres d'artistes qui font partie, comme Manet, du cercle amical de De Nittis.

""I heard the warning: /'Here is the tigers' kingdom""--Yosano Tekkan For over one thousand years, the image of the tiger spread from Buddhist temple carvings to other artistic forms across China and Korea. The tiger became a favorite subject for Japanese painters at the beginning of the seventeenth century. Beginning with artists of the Kano and Rimpa schools and making an appearance in the art of notable painters like Katsu Gyokushu, Matsui Genchu, Kishi Ganku, and Maruyama Okyo, depictions of the tiger roamed freely through scrolls and screens for centuries. And as the creation of woodblock prints known as "nishiki-e "grew in popularity in the late Edo period, tigers began to stalk through the internationally respected designs of masters like Hokusai, Kuniyoshi, Kunisada, Yoshitoshi, and Kyosai.
In "Tiger," Candice Black brings together one hundred classic representations of this extraordinary predator from across the arts, including depictions from prints, screens, scrolls, woodblocks, and lithographs. With images dating from the late sixteenth century to 1901, this gorgeous production faithfully documents the work of dozens of prominent and lesser known Japanese artists and presents the most comprehensive visual anthology of this majestic beast ever available to an English language audience.

This volume, the catalog to an international exhibition, focuses on the role art played in the display of power at the court of the Chinese emperor and at the royal court of Saxony-Poland. In over 400 examples, it contrasts the representative art of China and Europe and also serves as a handbook that explains and illustrates terms relating to this form of art. All objects are illustrated in color and are accompanied by a description and commentary. German text.

This catalogue contains over 2000 inscriptions from the Gwalior region of northern India dating from 300 BC to World War I. Looking at the history and culture of the region, the book also provides information on the dialects of language, religious cults and regional institutions.

This catalogue presents the captivating story of museum founder Robert Sterling Clark's important but little-known 1908-9 scientific expedition to northwest China. Over a century later, the context and significance of his adventure are being explored, and bringing to light important cultural and archaeological discoveries. Trained as a civil engineer, Clark brought a scientist's curiosity to the planning of his journey, assembling a talented professional team that included a surveyor, a doctor and meteorologist, an artist, and the British naturalist Arthur de Carle Sowerby, as well as some thirty additional support staff. Departing from the city of Taiyuan in Shanxi province, the Clark expedition traversed the provinces of Shaanxi and Gansu, reaching as far westward as Lanzhou before returning to Taiyuan. In all, the team covered nearly 2000 miles, primarily on horse and mule, and the resulting research launched Sowerby's career as the leading authority on Chinese fauna. Beautifully illustrated with archival photographs, "Sterling Clark in China" details the artistic, historical, and cultural legacy of a fascinating voyage.