Abstract
IN the exhibition of Buddhist paintings now open in the Edward VII Gallery of the British Museum (Bloomsbury) the examples shown have been selected with the view of demonstrating the different types of religious painting which have been produced by Buddhist thought and belief in the varying environment of, so far as possible, the whole of mid- and farther Asia. It covers the manifestations of Buddhist religious art in China, Japan, Korea, Siam, Tibet and Turkestan. No equally comprehensive exhibition has ever been held previously in England. The opportunity for such a display has arisen through the acquisition of several important paintings from Korea and Siam with the Eumorfopoulos collection, which also includes the first two examples to reach the Museum of the wall paintings recovered from Turfan by A. von Le Coq. Tibetan painting is represented by a selection from a series of the sixteen Arhats and the four Lokapalas from a temple at Shigatse, deposited on loan by Mr. J. C. French. They are much earlier than those usually seen in Europe. Of great interest to the student of early Far Eastern painting are the Japanese reproductions in collotype of the famous eighth-century wall paintings from the Buddhist shrine at Höryüji. The five shown are each twelve feet high. These paintings are especially remarkable, owing to the fact that they are examples of the fresco art of the T'ang period of China, which has vanished from her own soil. In an official account of the exhibits, it is justly pointed out that the key to the exhibition is the full selection from the paintings recovered by Sir Aurel Stein from the sealed chamber of the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas, near Tun-huang in Sinkiang. Some of the woodcuts from the same source are the earliest known in the world. To round off the demonstration, reproductions of the Ajanta frescoes are shown as an indication of the different kind of painting produced in the original home of Buddhism. The common bond in the religion which all these schools of painting served, indicates the extent to which these parts of Asia formed a cultural unity ; while the examples themselves illustrate the richness and variety of religious painting in the East.
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Exhibition of Buddhist Paintings. Nature 141, 823 (1938). https://doi.org/10.1038/141823b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/141823b0