Until 1 September 1996
Kimbell Art Museum, Texas, USA

24 September 24 - 15 December 15 1996
Idemitsu Museum of Arts, Tokyo

Masterpieces of Asian Sculpture from the Musée Guimet

The Path of Enlightenment

For more than 2,000 years, Buddhism has provided inspiration for many of the greatest icons of Asian art; this ancient, enduring philosophy has also played a pivotal role in serving to link the various cultures of Asia. The Path of Enlightenment: Masterpieces of Asian Sculpture from the Musée Guimet, Paris traces the development of Buddhist sculpture from its origin in India along the Silk Road and across maritime trade routes throughout all of Asia - some 12 countries. The stylistic interconnections that exist between these varied Asian cultures are explored through masterpieces in stone, wood, bronze, and precious metals, ranging in date from the 1st through the 19th century. The genesis of Buddhist sculpture took form during the Kushan period (1st-3rd century) in north central India where two schools of Buddhist art flourished: one in Gandhara (parts of present-day Pakistan and Afghanistan) and the other in the city of Mathura (now in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh). The second century Kushan Fragment of a Balustrade with a Woman carrying an Offering deeply carved from red sandstone, displays the soft, rounded forms and archaic smile descended from an earlier tradition of Indian sculpture. Gandharan works, such as the schist Standing Bodhisattva (1st-3rd century), reveal a strong Graeco- Roman influence in the precisely rendered musculature and the naturalistic treatment of the drapery. The large red sandstone Standing Buddha epitomizes the classical Gupta-period style of Mathura in the 5th century and represents the prototype from which all Buddhist art in Asia derives. The subsequent spread of Buddhism is documented in a broad range of sculptures from Central Asia, China, Korea, and Japan. A menacing 13th century wood and polychrome figure of Bishamonten from Japan owes a debt to 10th-century Guardian King figures from the great Central Asian Buddhist caves at Dunhuang, illustrating well the dissemination of certain stylistic conventions throughout East Asia. Closer to the Asian subcontinent, the bejewelled gilt bronze figure of Queen Maya, dating to the early 19th century, embraces the Nepalese affinity towards adornment, whereas the unique artistic expression of esoteric Buddhism practised in Tibet is given form in the fierce, yet elegantly crafted gilt and inlaid Hevajra and Nairatmya, a masterpiece of 16th century Tibetan metalwork.

Exquisite sculptures
The maritime route that carried the Buddhist faith to Southeast Asia is illustrated with works from Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, and Java. Among its corpus of Asian sculpture, the Guimet's pre-Khmer and Khmer stone objects from Cambodia are unsurpassed and rank among the world's great sculptures. The exhibition includes nine outstanding examples, including what is one of the most exquisite pieces of Cambodian stone sculpture, the late 12th century Kneeling Tara from Preah Khan, Angkor. The island of Java in the Indonesian Archipelago also emerged as a great power in Southeast Asia in the late 8th and 9th centuries. Javanese artists excelled in the production of 'miniature' representations of various Buddhist deities in bronze. Despite its diminutive scale, the charmingly corpulent figure of Jambhala (9th-10th century), the god of wealth, is noteworthy for its emphasis on elaborate jewellery and complex surface decoration. Contrasted to the richly ornamented Javanese bronzes is the elegant abstraction of physiognomy of the late Thai bronze Head of a Crowned Buddha (15th-16th century).
In 1879 Emile Guimet (1836-1918) built a museum in Lyon, which he subsequently donated to that city, to house his vast collection of objects and works of art gathered from his trips around the world, particularly India, China, and Japan. Ten years later he opened a replica of the Lyons building in Paris. From 1920 to 1945 the riches of several French archaeological expeditions in Asia were added to the museum, greatly expanding the breadth of the collection. The works brought back from Central Asia, China, Afghanistan, and Cambodia form the core of the collections today. The Musée Guimet is now home to an encyclopaedic collection that represents the various arts of every Asian culture.

Kimbell Art Museum
333 Camp Bowie Boulevard
Forth Worth, Texas 76107-2792
Tel: +1-817-3328451
Fax: +1-817-8771264

Idemitsu Museum of Arts
3-1-1 Marunouchi, Chiyoda-ku
Tokyo
Tel: +81-3-32133111