Provide a 7 pages analysis while answering the following question: The Growth of Asian Arts in Europe and America. Prepare this assignment according to the guidelines found in the APA Style Guide. An abstract is required. Scholarly sources in the form of journal articles have been perused for composing this essay.
Provide a 7 pages analysis while answering the following question: The Growth of Asian Arts in Europe and America. Prepare this assignment according to the guidelines found in the APA Style Guide. An abstract is required. Scholarly sources in the form of journal articles have been perused for composing this essay.
Recently in the United States of America, The Asia Society organized a couple of important exhibitions, which typify the changing perception of Asian art in the West. The exhibition called ‘Buddha of the Future’ featured a bronze statue of Buddhist deity Maitreya which is nearly twelve hundred years old. Originally sculpted in Thailand, the artefact drew the attention and admiration of patrons and scholars alike, who unanimously agreed that it is a masterpiece. This masterpiece was accompanied by other equally remarkable exhibits of Asian art dating back a millennium. One of the reasons for this connection between the audience and the exhibit is the general awareness of Buddhist philosophy among western intellectuals. Books on Zen Buddhism have found a wide readership in Europe and America. So, this initial acquaintance to an alien philosophy of life had whetted the appetite for further exploration of the culture of the East, as manifest in the Maitreya sculpture. According to one visitor of the exhibition, he “admired the sheer beauty of the Maitreya figure and other related images in the first exhibition and appreciated the information that accompanied the displays. He explained that he could enjoy the images as great works of art because they “transcended” their time and place. the label information simply amplified his visual pleasure” (Desai, 1995).
Further, the fact that such works were made of more durable materials have enhanced their value in the eyes of Western art critics, whose bias arises from equating durability with a high civilization. This is reflected in the fact that “until the Western paradigm of the ‘authentic’ primitive art became firmly established, certain ephemeral yet nonetheless major areas of Indian Art – such as folk textiles and tribal objects – remained outside the canon of Asian art history as .practised in the West as well as in the Asian countries” (Desai, 1995). . .
