The race against time to conserve Tibetan Buddhist art

A deeper examination of Buddhist statuary in Chinese history

A superlative examination of a fierce philosophical debate

How the life of Dao'an reflects the transmission of Buddhism to China

There are few better examples of the Mongolian Buddhist heritage than Ikh Khüree, known today as none other than Ulaanbaatar itself, the country’s capital. A seamless fusion of nomadic prac

A scholar visits the world of Northern Wei female patrons

Every now and then, one encounters an item of human culture that is so striking and poignant that one sincerely believes there is nothing else in the world’s museums like it. Two of these remarkable i

The common narrative of Chinese dynastic history is a story of the “sons of heaven” (tianzi 天子): great men (and one woman, Wu Zetian) who enforced the Mandate of Heaven until they lost it and were ove

He came from ArsakesHe came, his camel’s bells jingling, Eastwards from enigmatic Persian lands.   He descended from his royal throne, Sparrows twittering as his brick-red robe fell acr

Beauty can serve a spiritual purpose. Presented in the right way, beautiful art can induce in its viewers faith and reverence in the Buddha and his teaching. To present a Buddha image or Buddhist art

E.M. Forster, when discussing novels, observed that the narration of “the king died and the queen also died” was a fact, but “the king died and the queen died of sadness” was a