Where Art Meets Science: Ancient Sculpture from the Hindu-Buddhist World (Cambodia)
Norton Simon Museum of Art, Pasadena, CA
Through August 1, 2011

Before ancient objects enter a museum collection, they often travel 
vast distances and endure various periods of use, disuse, loss, and 
rediscovery. Their original meaning and function can become lost or 
obscured. For this reason, museums conduct extensive research on all
 objects entering their collections. Curators and conservators 
faithfully survey objects for any hints about their origins and
 provenance to ensure their overall general health, factual
documentation and preservation. Where Art Meets Science: Ancient 
Sculpture from the Hindu-Buddhist World, a focused exhibition of
 primarily Cambodian sculpture from the Norton Simon foundations’
 permanent collections, examines the connoisseurship and conservation 
involved in identifying and preserving these ancient objects.

A collaboration between the museum’s assistant curator of Asian art, 
Melody N. Rod-ari, and its conservator, John Griswold, this small
 installation explores how the place of origin and date of an object
can be determined by the rendering of drapery pleats, hairstyles and
 ornaments of iconic statuary from South and Southeast Asia dating from
the 3rd through 13th centuries. Furthermore, analytical methods to 
help identify traces of pigments, binders, and applied organic
 materials will be introduced, as will a discussion about 
distinguishing ancient tool marks from later ones.

Website: www.nortonsimon.org/where-art-meets-science-ancient-sculpture-from-the-hindu-buddhist-world

Gods of Angkor: Bronzes from the National Museum of Cambodia

Getty Center, Los Angeles
Through August 14, 2011

The ancient capital of the Khmer people at Angkor, in northwest 
Cambodia, was once the heart of a large sphere of influence that
extended over much of mainland Southeast Asia. The bronzes in this 
exhibition’ masterworks from the collection of the National Museum of
 Cambodia represent the achievements of Khmer artists during the Angkor
 period (the ninth through the 15th centuries).
Bronze, a mixture of metals consisting primarily of copper and tin,
 was a preferred medium for giving form to the Hindu and Buddhist
divinities worshipped in Angkor and throughout the Khmer empire. The 
Khmer have always viewed bronze as a noble material, connoting
prosperity and success, and it has played a deeply meaningful role in 
their culture over many centuries.

Website: www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/gods_angkor/

The Way of the Elders: The Buddha in Modern Theravada Traditions
Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Los Angeles

Through March 25, 2012

Theravada, or “The Way of the Elders,” is the school of Buddhism practiced today in Sri Lanka and much of Southeast Asia. Central to Theravada worship is the historic Buddha, Shakyamuni (circa fifth century BC). Shakyamuni was born after numerous rebirths, which are recounted in jatakas, or birth stories, the last ten of which are of paramount importance. These ten are depicted over and over on manuscript pages, textiles, and monastery walls. The last of these popular stories is the one concerning the Buddha’s final life as Shakyamuni, the lifetime in which he reaches enlightenment. Works in this exhibition illustrate a range of media produced in Burma (Myanmar), Cambodia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand from the eighteenth century to the present. They represent the Buddha in a variety of forms, as figures in his previous births, as the Buddha with monks and lay worshippers, and as symbols, such as the Buddha’s footprints. Contemporary Southeast Asian artists continue to draw inspiration from traditional Buddhist imagery, as in a painting by the Thai artist Kamol Tassananchalee which will be on view as part of this exhibition.

Website: www.lacma.org/art/ExhibInstallations.aspx#woe

8 June – 16 October at the Hawaii Children’s Discovery Museum

A traveling exhibit on the world’s refugees has made its way to Honolulu. “Torn From Home: My Life as a Refuge” takes young visitors and adults on an inspiring, hands-on journey into the lives of millions of children who were forced to flee their homes in conflict regions throughout the world.

The exhibit is on a national five-year tour and will celebrate its grand opening at the Hawaii Children’s Discovery Center on June 20, recognized as World Refugee Day, with vibrant cultural performances, ethnic foods and more from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. The exhibit will remain in Hawaii through October 16, 2010.

“Torn From Home: My Life as a Refugee” gives children and adults an opportunity to gain a firsthand look into the often challenging realities faced by refugee children and their families, and yet experience the personal triumphs of rebuilding their lives in a new land. It showcases seven exhibit areas: Home, Losing Home, Registration, Refugee Camp, Medical Clinic and Going Home.

The self-guided tour walks museum visitors through exhibit areas where they will learn about the shelter, food, medical care, schooling, and play activities of children in refugee camps. The exhibition features interactive multimedia, as well as photographs, artwork and testimonials of refugee children from countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Colombia, and Afghanistan.

“By hosting this exhibit, we hope that children and adults in Hawaii become more aware of what is happening in other countries throughout the world,” says Loretta Yajima, president of the Board of Directors at the Hawaii Children’s Discovery Center. “We hope that awareness will help them to develop a sense of empathy and compassion, while also exploring themes such as “What makes a home?” and “What is peace?”

The Hawaii Children’s Discovery Center has partnered with local community organizations, as well as individuals from regions including Laos, Vietnam and Burma, to recognize Hawaii’s own refugee populations. Monthly cultural events will showcase each culture through food, performances, and more.

The Center has also crafted extension exhibits specifically designed to address Hawaii’s diverse immigrant communities. Children will gain traits such as understanding the beauty of our differences by participating in various projects, such as creating a peace quilt. The Center itself has galleries of hands-on, interactive exhibits that help children learn about themselves and the world beyond our Island shores through exploration and guided self-discovery.

“Torn From Home: My Life as a Refugee” was developed in partnership with Lied Discovery Children’s Museum in Las Vegas, Nevada, and international aid organizations including UNHCR, the UN refugee agency. Philanthropist and part-time Hawaii resident, Pam Omidyar helped conceive the exhibit and personally provided core funding. Transportation funding to Hawaii was provided by Unbound Philanthropy.

Hawaii Children’s Discovery Center | Torn From Home: My Life as a Refugee Exhibit

Segueing from this month’s featured NPR series on the Mekong River, CSEAS came across two museums that explore Northern Thailand’s historic association with the opium trade. Interestingly, although these museums share a regional and topical focus, they exhibit the area’s opium-related past in their own distinct way.

Founded by the Princess Mother, the nationally-run Hall of Opium educates the public about the “social, economic and physical costs of drug abuse, and the crime and corruption that surrounds it and efforts to control it.” After learning about the Opium War, the Hall of Opium also serves the community through exhibits on drug control, case studies, and victim/excuse gallery. After trekking through nearly 9,000 years of opium in the Golden Triangle, the exhibition ends in the aptly named “Hall of Reflection” – where visitors can reflect upon their experience in the presence of “[q]uotations from famous individuals… on the value of leading a life of moderation.” In addition to guiding the museum’s “Just Say No” narrative, HRH The Princess also enacted several crop substitution initiatives to help villagers transition away from opium cultivation for sustenance.

The House of Opium, on the other hand, is a private institution that appears more interpretive of the opium trade’s cultural effects. Owner Mrs. Patcharee Srimattayakul, who used to run a souvenir shop in Sob Ruak Village, was inspired to establish the museum when her knack for acquiring small antiques and curios led to felt disappointment at losing these culturally significant artifacts in the tourist trade. Alongside more standard information about opium history and practice, the House of Opium also includes a fascinating collection of anatomically bead pipes from the Srikasetra Period and contemporary art and photography. Appropriate given the owner’s former business, visitors can even “take back home with them their own collection of effigies, masks, opium pipes scales and boxes… and much more from the gift shop.”

Hall of Opium
Moo 1 Ban Sop Ruak, Tambon Wiang, Amphoe Chiang Saen,
Chiang Rai 57150
Tel: +66 (0) 5378 4444-6
Fax: +66 (0) 5365 2133
E-mail: hallofopium@doitung.org
more info

House of Opium
212 Moo.1 (Sobruak Village)
Tumbon Wiang, Umpoe Chinag Sean,
Chiang Rai Province
Thailand 57150
Tel: (+66) 53-784-060
FAX: (+66) 63-784-062
Email: bangkoktequila999@hotmail.com
more info

75th Anthropology Anniversary Colloquium Series Fall 2009 – Museums, Anthropology and the Work of Culture in Contemporary Vietnam: The Politics of Memory in the Exhibit “Hanoi Life under the Subsidy Era” at the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology
Co-Sponsored by the Center for Southeast Asian Studies
Thursday, 19 November 2009, 3:00 PM at Crawford 105, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa
Presented by Margaret Bodemer, Ph.D. Candidate in Anthropology

A recent exhibit at the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology (VME) titled “Hanoi Life under the Subsidy Era” enlisted Hanoi residents – “ordinary citizens” – to document and discuss their experiences through a critical period in recent Vietnamese history. In this presentation I draw on 12 months of fieldwork at the VME in Hanoi to explore the significance of the exhibit, and the museum practices that produced it, for longer historical transformations in Vietnamese national identity. In the exhibit, people talked about their experiences and life strategies under the postwar, subsidy economy in Hanoi (1975-1986). In effect, the exhibit provided an alternative narrative, “a view from below,” in contrast to the official national history of Vietnam, which posits the state as the main actor in important events. In this presentation I argue that the exhibit constitutes a new emerging perspective on the relationship between people and the state in contemporary Vietnam. The presentation is part of a larger dissertation project that explores the transformations of Vietnamese ethnology and museums in the context of shifting visions of Vietnam from a colony without an indigenous civilization to a modern, independent, multi-ethnic nation state.

Maggie Bodemer is a doctoral candidate in anthropology at UH Manoa. Her work in cultural anthropology focuses on issues of culture, national identity and the state. Her publications include articles in Asian Ethnology (Japan), Asian Anthropology (Hong Kong), and Explorations in Southeast Asian Studies. With museum director Nguyen Van Huy, she co-edited the volume Faces, Voices, and Lives: My Experiences in Building a Museum for Communities, published in 2008 by The Gioi Publishers.

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March 18, 12:00 p.m.
Presented by Professor Jerome Feldman, Hawaii Pacific University

In the Danish National Museum, there are many unique remnants of a once great chief’s house from Nias, Indonesia. These are some truly fine works of art from a vanishing tradition on a remote island. The visitor however would never suspect the incredible story behind these now scattered but extraordinary artifacts. It is a narrative of high art and high achievement with a heavy overlay of criminality and debauchery.

Jerome Feldman teaches art history at Hawaii Pacific University. His specialization is in the arts of tribal Southeast Asia and the Pacific Islands. He received his Ph.D. in tribal art history from Columbia University and has conducted field studies in remote islands of Indonesia and Polynesia. He has studied museum collections in Europe and America and has aided in several important exhibitions including The Eloquent Dead at the Fowler Museum at UCLA, Nias Tribal Treasures at the Volkenkundig Meumeu Nusantara in Delft, and Beyond the Java Sea a Smithsonian sponsored traveling exhibition. He has also written books and articles and lectured extensively on tribal Southeast Asian, Micronesian and Polynesian art and architecture. In fall 2004, he was the Slade Visiting Professor at Cambridge University, England. between distribution patterns of human knowledge of biodiversity and actual biodiversity.