Religious Art and Culture in 2019: Thousand Faces of the Buddha (original) (raw)

The Art College of Sichuan University, China (Zhōngguó in old Chinese ), organized an International Symposium on “Religious Art and Culture in 2019” in which scholars from different parts of the Eurasian world were invited to present papers that were discussed for a better understanding of the recent trends. Specialists in Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Christianity had submitted papers, taken up for discussion allowing thirty minutes for each thesis. Majority of the scholars were from mainland China (sixty-three) and twelve from India, Russia, Cambodia, Israel, Japan, South Korea and Pakistan. Sponsored by the Sichuan University, the host was its Art College. The venue was in Chengdu, conducted during October 26-27, 2019. The discussed themes covered the major religions of the globe focusing on comparative analysis. Completing the academic sessions, the participants were visiting some major centers of Buddhist art around the conference venue in the lowland region in southwestern China, also known as the ‘Red Basin’ . The region is fully surrounded by mountains and covered by Yangtze River and its tributaries . This brief article is focus on the problems investigated in the conference, and wonders of Buddhist art in China, of which we have no idea in Indian textbooks dealing with Asian art. It deserves a key-place because China is the land of ‘Many [sahasra]-Buddhas’, from Gautama the Śākyamuni to the yet to come Maitreya .