Shivalal (Indian, active 1858–93), Maharana Fateh Singh crossing a river during the monsoon (detail), opaque watercolor and gold on paper, 82.6 x 158.8 cm, The City Palace Museum, Udaipur, courtesy The Cleveland Museum of Art

As a continuation from last week’s newsletter, here are some more great museum exhibitions in New York and elsewhere to check out this summer.

The Cleveland Museum of Art
A Splendid Land: Paintings from Royal Udaipur
On view through Sept 10, 2023

Around 1700, artists in Udaipur (a court in northwest India) began creating immersive paintings that convey the mood (bhava) of the city’s palaces, lakes, and mountains. With dazzling paintings on paper and cloth—many on public view for the first time—A Splendid Land reveals how artists visualized emotions, depicted places, celebrated water resources, and fostered personal bonds over 200 years in the rapidly changing political and cultural landscapes of early modern South Asia.

For more information, click here.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Woven Wonders: Indian Textiles from the Parpia Collection
On view through September 4, 2023

The Parpia Collection is one of the most significant private collections of Indian textiles outside of India and one of the most important in the United States. Woven Wonders: Indian Textiles from the Parpia Collection brings this extraordinary collection to Houston audiences for the first time.

For more information, click here.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Tree & Serpent: Early Buddhist Art in India, 200 BCE–400 CE
Newly opened on July 21–November 13, 2023

Featuring more than 140 objects dating from 200 BCE to 400 CE, the exhibition presents a series of evocative and interlocking themes to reveal both the pre-Buddhist origins of figurative sculpture in India and the early narrative traditions that were central to this formative moment in early Indian art.

For more information, click here.

Nelson Atkins Museum of Art
Picturing Paradise: Blue and Green in Chinese Painting
January 6–August 6, 2023

Beginning in the 400s C.E., Chinese painters used qinglü, a palette of blues and greens, to depict paradise or fantastical places. The paintings and objects dating from the 1200s to 1800s in this exhibition, organized by the Nelson-Atkins, exemplify the enduring tradition of blue and green landscape painting. The colorful landscape paintings span many contexts, showing how a visual vocabulary can be created, built upon, and transformed.

And

Found in Translation: Explorations by 8 Contemporary Artists
October 8, 2022–August 20, 2023

We often hear of the risks of losing meaning in translation. But visual artists are skilled at converting ideas and questions into art. Found in Translation: Explorations by 8 Contemporary Artists reveals the richness and nuance that can be discovered through this process of change and transformation. These eight artists use their practices to explore evolving personal questions tied to place, memory, relationships, and other complex topics.

For more information, click here.

Philadelphia Museum of Art
Oneness: Nature and Connectivity in Chinese Art
On view through October 29, 2023

This exhibition features the work of four contemporary artists whose practices examine the boundaries between humans and nature from a philosophical, spiritual, and material perspective. All the featured artists embrace and adapt historic Chinese artistic traditions through their chosen materials, process, or themes.

For more information, click here.

San Antonio Museum of Art
Creative Splendor: Japanese Bamboo Baskets from the Thoma Collection
July 15, 2022–January 2, 2024

This exhibition consists of a series of three installations of approximately 15 baskets each that will survey the outstanding accomplishments of Japanese basket makers active since the 19th century to the present day from three regions of Japan: Kansai, Kanto, and the southernmost island of Kyushu. The exhibition demonstrates the specific techniques and styles of cutting and weaving bamboo that are particular to each of these geographic regions.

For more information, click here.

Tibet House US
Alchi: Visions of Enlightenment
Monumental Photographs by Peter Van Ham
On view through September 2023

View monumental photographs of the world-renowned Buddhist monastery complex of Alchi by Peter van Ham. Mandalas and towering sculptures of Bodhisattvas adorn the walls, ceilings and doors of each temple and include scenes from the Buddha’s life as well as secular life from a period of tremendous cross-cultural activity in the region. Spend this summer in this immersive exhibition and view some of the oldest surviving paintings in Ladakh.

For more information, click here.

Installation view of Explore Asia

Starting tomorrow, July 21st, Asia Society Texas will unveil their new permanent, immersive exhibition Explore Asia. Highlighting five Asian countries – China, India, Japan, South Korea, and Vietnam – across six unique experiences, Explore Asia is the only interactive learning exhibition in Texas focused specifically on Asia.

Beginning with a lively lion dance, the three-day celebration features all-ages fun, food, and activities. Learn more deeply about the highlighted countries and their arts, cultures, and traditions through hands-on activities and demonstrations, and enjoy storytimes and locally-owned food trucks as part of the fun!

Admission is free, but registration (online or walk-up) is required. Timed tickets are available for two-hour time slots each day. Admission to the interactive Performances Across Asia Drumming Experience is separate of general admission; tickets are limited-quantity and cost $6 per guest.

Presented by The Ling and George Yang Family.

For more information, click here.

Fukuda Kodōjin, Blue-green Landscape, February 1926 (detail), hanging scroll, ink and color on silk, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Gift of the Clark Center for Japanese Art & Culture 2013.29.902

This comprehensive retrospective of scholar-artist Fukuda Kodōjin will close this Sunday, July 23rd at the Minneapolis Institute of Art.  Kodōjin continued the tradition of Japanese literati painting (nanga) after 1900. His painting style is characterized by bizarrely shaped mountain forms rendered in vivid color or monochromatic ink that often include a solitary scholar enjoying the expansive beauty of nature. Not only a painter, Kodōjin was also an accomplished poet and calligrapher patronized by influential industrialists and politicians of the era. Following his death, he slipped into obscurity, and today is better appreciated in the United States and Europe.

To view the exhibition, click here.

Je Tsongkhapa, Mongolia, 18th century, Gilt bronze, 17 ¾ in. (45 cm.)

Tsongkhapa, also known as Je Rinpoche, was born in the Amdo region of Tibet in 1357. He was a highly respected Buddhist scholar and is credited as being the founder of the Gelug Buddhist sect, known as the “Yellow Hat” sect, one of the most powerful and widespread in the Buddhist religion. Revered as an incarnation of the bodhisattva Manjushri, he was reported to have seen and conversed with the deity from a young age. The current bronze example can be seen holding the stems of lotus flowers supporting a sword and book, which are the prime attributes of bodhisattva Manjushri.

Compare this powerful piece with a related gilt-bronze figure of Tsongkhapa, 18th century, illustrated in B.Lipton and N.D.Ragnubs, Treasures of Tibetan Art: Collections of the Jacques Marchais Museum of Tibetan Art , p.70, no.22.

For more information click here

Paul Binnie, Scottish, b. 1967, The Genroku Pose in Shibaraku (Genroku mie), kappazuri (stencil print) on reddish-brown hosho paper, lavishly embellished with splattered gold and silver mica highlights; signed BINNIE in sumi ink at lower left, with red artist's seal Bin-ni and date seal Heisei roku nen (Heisei 6 [1994]) at lower right, signed and numbered in pencil below, Paul Binnie, 23/25, 1994, 25 5/8 by 38 3/8 in., 65 by 97.5 cm, courtesy Scholten Japanese Art

Online at Scholten Japanese Art
Backstage Pass: KABUKI (Part Two)

Scholten Japanese Art is pleased to extend backstage passes to the second half of their most exclusive kabuki theater (of the mind)! Part Two of this online exhibition features a selection of shin hanga prints and related ephemera that will have you come face-to-face with the most extraordinary actors of the kabuki theater.

View the exhibition here.

One of a pair of book covers for a Dharani Samgraha (detail), Nepal, 1650-1700, opaque watercolor and gold on wood; courtesy National Museum of Asian Art

In July, there are some great museum exhibitions in New York and elsewhere with a few listed below to check out.

The Art Institute Chicago
Ghosts and Demons in Japanese Art
July 15–Oct 15, 2023

The prints on view in this exhibition, all from our celebrated Clarence Buckingham collection, capture common Japanese folk tales as well as their Kabuki adaptations from the early 18th-century to the last years of the 19th century, offering distinct insight into the nature of these beloved stories and characters.

For more information, click here

Asia Society
Buddha, Sage of the Shakya Clan: Masterworks from the Mr. and Mrs. John D. Rockefeller 3rd Collection
On view through August 27, 2023

While the actual life events of Shakyamuni Buddha are not well documented, there are several legendary stories that contain significant moments of his life. In this exhibition, the sculptures and paintings on display capture the mythology of Buddha's life and the “Eight Great Events” that transformed it.

For more information, click here

Asian Art Museum
Hell: Arts of Asian Underworlds
On view through September 18, 2023

This exhibition is a rollicking romp through the many ways that Asian visual cultures have imagined the afterlife of the condemned over time. Paintings, sculptures, maps, puppets, and religious objects from India, Tibet, China, Korea, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand, Myanmar, and the Philippines offer a colorful variety of visions of the underworld, ranging from the serious to the light-hearted.

and

Chinese Paintings: A Selection of Modern Masters
On view through September 9, 2023

This exhibition presents highlights from the Chinese modern painting collection with a focus on ink masters from renowned regional schools in the second half of the 20th century, when artists’ trajectories became increasingly cross-cultural.

For more information, click here

The Korea Society:
Koreatown LA/NY Photo Series by Emanuel Hahn/Janice Chung
On view through August 17, 2023

Photographers Emanuel Hahn and Janice Chung present poignant portraits from two “Koreatowns,” one in Los Angeles and one in New York. It is a celebration of the Korean immigrants and their experiences, and the artists ask the viewer to reconsider the common notions of what it means to be from “here.”

For more information, click here

Minneapolis Institute of Art
Fukuda Kodōjin: Japan's Great Poet and Landscape Artist
Closing soon on July 23, 2023

Fukuda Kodōjin was one of a handful of scholar-artists who continued the tradition of Japanese literati painting after 1900. Not only a painter, Kodōjin was also an accomplished poet and calligrapher patronized by influential industrialists and politicians of the era. This is the first-ever exhibition of Kodōjin outside Japan.

and

The Art of Literacy in Early Modern Japan
On view through August 6, 2023

From the 1600s to the 1800s, the printing industry developed rapidly, making printed materials available to readers in urban and rural areas alike. This exhibition considers two forms of literacy, textual and visual, that enabled people to participate in a burgeoning public life.

For more information, click here

National Museum of Asian Art
The Art of Knowing in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Himalayas
Ongoing view

Bringing together highlights from our collections, this exhibition explores religious and practical knowledge across time, space, and cultures. Featuring stone sculptures, gilt bronzes, and painted manuscripts from India, Nepal, Tibet, Bangladesh, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Cambodia, and Indonesia, the show illuminates the critical role of visual culture in conveying Buddhist and Hindu teachings from the ninth to the twentieth centuries.

and

Afterlife: Ancient Chinese Jades
Ongoing view

The jades in this show represent the earliest epochs of Chinese civilization, the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age. Many came from the prehistoric burials of the Liangzhu culture (circa 3300–2250 BCE) and provide insight into the dynamic character of ancient Chinese civilization during life and after death.

For more information, click here

Rubin Museum of Art
Death is Not the End
On view through January 14, 2024

This exhibition explores notions of death and afterlife through the art of Tibetan Buddhism and Christianity. During a time of great global turmoil, loss, and uncertainty, it invites contemplation of the universal human condition of impermanence and the desire to continue to exist.

For more information, click here

Yale University Art Gallery
Selections from the Asian Art Collection
On view through November 19, 2023

This new installation in the Asian Art Galleries includes a Daoist priest’s robe from 17th-century China, another robe from 19th-century Kashmir, and two 17th-century Iranian tapestries. In addition, Femininity and Its Forms features Iranian and Indian paintings depicting idealized, elegantly dressed, and bejeweled women, whether in intimate or public spaces, while Omnipresent: Tradition in Chinese Painting explores the endless allusions to earlier compositions and styles of brushwork in Chinese painting.

For more information, click here

Shigematsu Ayumi 重松あゆみ, Yellow Jomon, Stoneware, H12.7″ x W11.0″ x D10.4″, H32.5×W28 ×D26.5cm

Dai Ichi Arts
Clay in Motion: Women Artists in Contemporary Japanese Ceramics
July 20 – August 25, 2023

Dai Ichi Arts is delighted to present the summer exhibition Clay in Motion: Women Artists in Japanese Ceramics. This group spotlights the works of several distinguished contemporary women artists. From emerging artists, to artists who are part of a vanguard generation of highly influential post-war artists in Japan, the works presented in this exhibition are imbued with intelligence, creativity, and sensitivity for form.

For more information click here. 

Stūpa drum panel with protective serpent. Amaravati stupa, Guntur district, Andhra Pradesh. Sātavāhana, second half of 1st century–early 2nd century CE. Limestone, 145×77.5×10 cm. Excavated by Walter Elliot, Commissioner of Guntur, 1845; transferred to Madras,1856; shipped to East India House, London, 1859; transferred to the India Museum, London; transferred to the British Museum, 1880 Collection: British Museum, London

Tree & Serpent: Early Buddhist Art in India, 200 BCE–400 CE
July 21-November 13, 2023
(Members Preview on July 17)

Featuring more than 140 objects dating from 200 BCE to 400 CE, the exhibition presents a series of evocative and interlocking themes to reveal both the pre-Buddhist origins of figurative sculpture in India and the early narrative traditions that were central to this formative moment in early Indian art. With major loans from a dozen lenders across India, as well as from the United Kingdom, Europe, and the United States, it transports visitors into the world of early Buddhist imagery that gave expression to this new religion as it grew from a core set of ethical teachings into one of the world’s great religions. Objects associated with Indo-Roman exchange reveal India’s place in early global trade. The exhibition showcases objects in various media, including limestone sculptures, gold, silver, bronze, rock crystal, and ivory. Highlights include spectacular sculptures from southern India—newly discovered and never before publicly exhibited masterpieces—that add to the world canon of early Buddhist art.

For more information, click here.

Exhibition View, Alchi: Visions of Enlightenment, Tibet House US

Tibet House US exhibition, Alchi: Visions of Enlightenment, has now been extended through December.

View monumental photographs of the world-renowned Buddhist monastery complex of Alchi by Peter van Ham. At an altitude of ten thousand feet nestled in a lush valley surrounded by the majestic Himalayas, Alchi is a destination for art lovers and seekers alike. Mandalas and towering sculptures of Bodhisattvas adorn the walls, ceilings and doors of each temple and include scenes from the Buddha’s life as well as secular life from a period of tremendous cross-cultural activity in the region. Spend this summer in this immersive exhibition and view some of the oldest surviving paintings in Ladakh.

For more information click here.