Buddhist Art and Tibetan Patronage Ninth to Fourteenth Centuries

Increasing accessibility of Tibet has provided important new insights on the history and context of Tibetan art. This book discusses the impact of Tibetan patronage on Buddhist artistic monuments from both the heartland of Tibet as well as its far (cultural) borders.

A score of experts here explore the dialectic between local and "foreign" traditions. Thus the role of Indian artistic traditions, the merging with Chinese, Kidan and Turkic artistic features come to the fore, while at the same time Central Tibet gets ample attention.

Recent field research and the study of previously neglected primary literary (inscriptional) evidence make clear that the study of Tibetan art is still in its infancy. This edited volume is the first comprehensive guide to emerging new insights on the intricate context in which Tibetan art emerged and flourished.

Readership: All those interested in Tibetan art and culture.

Deborah Klimburg-Salter, Ph.D. (1976) Harvard University, Department of Fine Arts, (1990) Habilitation at the University of Viennna, Institute of Art History. She is currently Professor of Asian Art History at the Institute for Art History, University of Vienna, where she also directs an interdisciplinary research on the Cultural History of the Western Himalayas, 10th to 14th Centuries. Her research interests include the art history and archaeology of Afghanistan, Northern India, Tibet and Pakistan and she is the author of several monographs, of which Tabo - a Lamp for the Kingdom: Early Indo-Tibetan Buddhist Art in the Western Himalaya (Milan, 1997; New York 1998), is the most recent.

Eva Allinger, Mag.Phil. has studied Art History and Archaelogy, and Tibetology and Buddhist Studies at the University of Vienna. She has published on problems of style and iconography of Indo-Tibetan art (10th-14th centuries).