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Buddhist art of Myanmar review: a subtle,sculptural nirvanaAsia Society, New YorkOpening up of Burma has resulted in a beautiful and

fascinating exhibition of paintings, weavings and manuscripts – but it’s the sculpture

that really shines

Jason Farago

Parinibbana, from the Kubyauknge Temple, Myinkaba village, circa 1198. Photograph: Sean Dungan/Bagan Archaeological

Museum

Friday 13 February 2015 18.54

GMT

“Beauty is meaningless until it is shared,” wrote George Orwell in Burmese Days – hiscoruscating !rst novel of life in south-east Asia during the last days of the Raj. It wastruer than Orwell could have realized. For !ve decades after 1962, when a militarydictatorship took power in Burma, the country’s rich cultural legacy was essentiallyput on ice. (After the widespread protests in 1988 and the emergence of Aung SanSuu Kyi, the junta changed the country’s name to Myanmar – a decision that stillgrates. The Guardian prefers to call the country Burma.)

Museums languished, starved of modern conservation science or even electricity.Looting, already a problem in the colonial era, continued under the kleptocraticmilitary regime. International loans were unthinkable. Tourism was essentiallynonexistent. Censorship was standard.

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Yet four years ago, the military junta was o"cially dissolved, and Suu Kyi wasreleased from house arrest. The military still exerts great control – but Burma isopening up. Last year, the Metropolitan Museum of Art presented Lost Kingdoms, a

landmark exhibition of early south-east Asian art that included unprecedented loansfrom Burmese museums. Now comes Buddhist Art of Myanmar, a new exhibition atAsia Society: the !rst museum show in the United States to look solely at the art of south-east Asia’s least understood nation. Much of the art here has never left Burma.

It’s a bogglingly diverse nation, and its population of 50 million includes dozens of di# erent ethnic groups, though this show looks only at Buddhist cultural traditions.(Theravada Buddhists make up about 90% of today’s Burma, and running con$ictswith Rohingya Muslims and other ethnic minorities formed part of the pretext for theunta’s long rule.) Religious, linguistic, and stylistic diversity has been a constant in

Burmese history since the establishment of Buddhism by Indian monks around 500AD. A worn, enigmatic two-sided stele from that era, loaned from the NationalMuseum of Myanmar in Rangoon (it was also included in Lost Kingdoms last year),shows a warrior toting a huge club in both hands, attended by a deputies holdingsta# s with symbols of Vishnu. But on the back is a throne reminiscent of Buddhistkingship, and earlier documentation suggests that a Buddhist dharmachakra, orwheel of law, once hovered above the scene, as prominent as the Hindu symbols.

Buddha, Pyu period, eighth-ninth century. Photograph: Sean Dungan/Sri Ksetra Archaeological Museum, Hmawza


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Burmese art grew in sophistication as Buddhism took root, especially during thePagan period of the 11th to 13th centuries, which saw the Burmese language spreadacross the kingdom. Religious architecture proliferated – its capital, now calledBagan, is studded with soaring, gilded pagodas – and the life of the Buddha providedfertile material for both religious veneration and artistic experiments. There’s asandstone sculpture here, 900 years old, in which the Buddha sits cross-legged, eyesshut, with a sword in his right hand. He’s taking the blade to his own hair, choppingo# his topknot. The long path to enlightenment under the tree in Bodhgaya beginshere: the prince turns into a monk, mortality gives way to divinity.

The show features manuscripts, weavings, furniture, and more than a few paintings –including an exquisite illustrated folding book, painted on mulberry paper, thatdepicts the grand procession of Myanmar’s last king en route to a white pagoda, borne by an elephant. But sculpture is where the Buddhist art of Burma really shines, and its beauty and intensity re$ect not only monarchical power but everyday faith. InBurma, devout Theravada Buddhists evince a deep commitment to merit-making –the accrual of karma through acts of charity and self-sacri!ce – and donations of up toa quarter of one’s income are not uncommon. A bell whose holding ring is fringedwith lions, from the late 19th century, is inscribed on the circumference with theBurmese equivalent of an art donor thank-you: a mother and daughter, “with a clear,detached mind full of good intentions”, donated the bell with the express purpose of attaining nirvana.

Plaque with image of seated Buddha, pagan period, 11th–13th century. Photograph: Sean Dungan/Bagan Archaeological

Museum


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Asia Society has been working on this show since 2011, when the Obamaadministration relaxed sanctions against Burma as the country began reforms. It tookyears to convince o"cials to agree to loan the dozens of works on view here, and theresultant show isn’t a blockbuster. It is a quieter, subtler e# ort, a showcase of diplomacy as much as art history. There are better reasons to hope for political reformin Burma – and the possible ascent of Suu Kyi at this year’s critical elections – than themere possibility of western art loans. But beauty is meaningless unless it is shared. Itwould be wonderful to see shows like this more frequently, and even to start sendingour Pollocks and Warhols to the galleries of Rangoon.

Mara’s Demons, Shwegugyi Temple, Pegu, c. 1479 Photograph: Sean Dungan/Bagan Archaeological Museum

Buddhist art of Myanmar is at Asia Society, New York until 10 May. Details here


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