(listed alphabetically by the name of the museum or gallery)
Vietnam: Journeys of Body, Mind, and Spirit
American Museum of Natural History
New York, New York
through January 4, 2004
Woodblock prints and the woodblocks from which they are made; handmade textiles,
including tribal bridal costumes; historical and contemporary ceramics and baskets;
palanquins carried during festivals; votive paper goods; water puppets; toy motorbikes
made of recycled aluminum cans; the masks young children wear as they parade through
their neighborhoods on mid-Autumn festival; and an ancestral altar are among the four
hundred ceremonial and everyday items on view in this exhibition of life in Vietnam today,
which was organized in collaboration with the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology in Hanoi.
Himalayas: An Aesthetic Adventure
Art Institute of Chicago
Chicago, Illinois
April 5 - August 17
An exploration of the artistic achievement that developed from a spiritual
tradition unique to the Himalayas. Works of art from India, Kashmir, Nepal,
Pakistan, Tibet, and Bhutan—dating from the sixth to the nineteenth
centuries, from public and private collections in North America, Europe,
and Asia—including temple sculptures of stone and wood; terra-cotta
figures; bronzes that have been embellished with inlaid gemstones, gilding,
and paint; vividly colored paintings on cloth, palm leaf, paper, and wood;
and ritual objects of various media.
Montein Boonma: Temple of the Mind
Asia Society Museum
New York, New York
through May 11
A retrospective of the work of Montein Boonma (1953-2000). The Thai artist's
sculptural installations combine industrial materials such as steel and bricks
with ephemeral materials such as spices and fragrances in order to explore the
notion of works of art as spaces in which one can experience the senses and contemplate
the impermanence of human life and the physical world.
From Monastery to Marketplace: Books and Manuscripts of Asia
Asian Art Museum
San Francisco, California
through November 2
In honor of the museum's new building, which formerly housed San Francisco's
Main Library, an exhibition of secular and religious texts, albums, calligraphy,
and manuscripts—all from the museum's collection and dating from
the 1100s through the 1900s—that highlight the significance of illustrated
and written materials in Asian cultures.
Quiet Beauty: Fifty Centuries of Japanese Folk Ceramics from the
Montgomery Collection
Bard Graduate Center Gallery
New York, New York
through June 15
Japanese folk ceramics—primarily vernacular objects intended for
use by farmers, artisans, and merchants—dating from 3000 BCE to 1985
CE, that exemplify a near-perfect combination of form, proportion, color,
texture, line, gesture, movement, energy, and sense of spiritual harmony.
All of the objects are from the Montgomery Collection in Switzerland,
arguably the most important collection of Japanese folk art outside of
Japan.
Weaving China's Past: The Amy S. Clague Collection of Chinese Textiles
China Institute Gallery
New York, New York
through June 7
More than thirty examples of Chinese silk textiles—brocades, tapestries,
and embroideries— dating from the Song (960-129) through the Qing
(1644-1911) dynasties, including Buddhist ritual items, banners, clothing,
and throne covers.
The Sensuous and the Sacred: Chola Bronzes from South India
Dallas Museum of Art
Dallas, Texas
April 4 - June 15
South Indian bronzes produced between the ninth and thirteenth centuries, from important
collections of temple bronzes in the United States and Europe. Photomurals of temples,
as well as bronze statuary fully draped, ornamented, and ready for processional rituals,
recreate the context in which these religious icons are seen and worshiped in South Indian
temples today.
Selections from the Guoyun Lou Collection of the Shanghai Museum
Hong Kong Museum of Art
Hong Kong
through June 15
A collection of paintings and calligraphy assembled by Gu Wenbin (1811-1889)
of Suzhou and his descendants over a period of one hundred years and donated
to the Shanghai Museum in the mid-twentieth century spans the Song through
the Qing dynasties and includes works by Shen Zhou (1427-1509), Tang Yin
(1470-1523), Xu Wei (1521-93), Dong Qichang (1555-1636), the "Four Wangs"
(late sixteenth to early eighteenth centuries), Shitao (1641-1707), Gong
Xian (1619-89), and Hua Yan (1682-1756).
Transmitting the Forms of Divinity: Early Buddhist Art from Korea and Japan
Japan Society
New York, New York
April 9 - June 22
An exploration of the early development of Buddhist art in Korea and Japan and the
formative links between the ancient cultures of each nation through a selection of
sculptures, reliquaries, sutras, ritual objects, and ceramic roof tiles, dating from
the sixth through the ninth centuries and drawn from important museum and temple
collections in Korea and Japan. Among them are several National Treasures.
Luxury Textiles East and West: Ceremony and Celebration
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Los Angeles, California
through July 20
The first part of a three-part rotating exhibition celebrating the fiftieth anniversary
of the museum's Department of Costume and Textiles features ritual garments and ceremonial
textiles from the museum's collection, among them ritual vestments from China and Japan,
Buddhist needleloop diadems, and meticulously woven cloths from South and Southeast Asia,
including a large elephant patola.
Chinese Export Porcelain at The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
New York, New York
through July 3
Bowls and vases, ewers and tureens, plates and extensive services, dating from the
mid-sixteenth century through the third quarter of the nineteenth century, made in
China for the European and the American markets, all from the museum's extensive collection.
The History of Japanese Art Photography, 1854-2000
| The Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Texas through April 27 |
Cleveland Museum of Art Cleveland, Ohio May 25 - July 20 |
Half a Century of Chinese Woodblock Prints: From the Communist Revolution to the Open-Door
Policy and Beyond, 1945-1998
National Museum of Contemporary Art
Seoul through May 5
Prints produced from the time of the Chinese Communist Revolution to the present that
demonstrate the history and characteristics of modern woodblock printmaking in China.
Happy Birthday, Atom! Celebrating Tezuka's Astro Boy
The Ohio State University Cartoon Research Library
Columbus, Ohio
through May 31
An exhibition on manga and robots, in honor of the cartoon character
Tetsuwan Atomu ("Mighty Atom")—known as Astro Boy in English—
child robot created by Japanese cartoonist Osamu Tezuka (1928-1989). In
the original science fiction graphic novel that began publication in 1951,
the robot character was brought to life on April 7, 2003.
Guardian of the Flame: Art of Sri Lanka
Phoenix Art Museum
Phoenix, Arizona
through May 11
Paintings and sculptures, drawn from private collections, that highlight the Buddhist
and Hindu culture of Sri Lanka from the second to the nineteenth centuries.
Chen Zhen: A Tribute
P.S. 1 MoMA
Long Island City, New York
through May 25
Installations, sculptures, and drawings created during the last five years
of the artist's life. Among them, an enormous, interactive piece, Jue
Chang (50 Strokes to Each) (1998), consisting of more than a hundred
chairs and beds that have been stretched with animal skins to produce
makeshift drums, which viewers are invited to play. Zen Garden
( 2000), an alabaster and metal sculpture, explores the encounter and
fusion of two visions of medicine—Chinese and Western—in relation
to the human body. Chen, who emigrated from Shanghai to Paris in 1986,
died of autoimmune hemolytic anemia in December 2000, at the age of forty-five.
Auto*Focus: Raghubir Singh's Way into India
Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Washington, D.C. through August 10
Forty-eight photographs that combine the late Indian photographer Raghubir
Singh's passion for vibrant color and the Indian landscape with his fascination
with the Ambassador car, whose distinctive silhouette can be seen all
over India. The Ambassador appears in all the photographs: either it is
placed in the landscape, or, conversely, the landscape is seen through
the car's windows or reflected in its mirrors.
Image and Empire: Picturing India during the Colonial Era
The Arthur M. Sackler Museum
Cambridge, Massachusetts
through May 25
This exhibition highlights the shared innovations in style, subject matter, and vision
as both local and foreign artists undertook the task of picturing India during the
period of colonial expansion, from the seventeenth through the twentieth centuries,
and includes picturesque landscapes and "Company painting" (works commissioned by
British residents serving the East India Company), as well as luxurious ivories and
documentary photography.
Noguchi: Contours
UBS PaineWebber Art Gallery
New York, New York
April 10 - June 20
Twenty-seven works from the Noguchi Museum collection, including sixteen large-scale
scroll drawings of the human figure done in 1930, when Isamu Noguchi (1904-88) spent
eight months in Beijing studying with Qi Baishi. This is the first time these drawings
have been shown as a group since the 1930s.
Picturing Cathay: Maritime and Cultural Images of the China Trade
The University of Hong Kong Museum and Art Gallery
Hong Kong
through June 22
Over sixty paintings and export items from public and private collections—works
produced mostly in and around the ports of southern China, Hong Kong,
and Macao and dating from the mid-eighteenth to the late-nineteenth centuries—explore
how trade, particularly maritime trade, encouraged cross-cultural artistic
expression.
Tibet: Mountains and Valleys, Castles and Tents from the Newark Museum
Collection
Williams College Museum of Art
Williamstown, Massachusetts
through August 3
An exhibition that explores Tibetan culture through objects and ornaments,
some dating to the thirteenth century, of aristocrats, traders, and herdsmen,
as well as film and photographs from the first Western visitors to Tibet
in the early 1900s. Colorful garments, rugs, furniture, and ceremonial
headdresses, saddle blankets, prayer wheels, and portable wooden teapots
are among the artifacts on display.