In Buddha’s Picnic, Tibetan artist, Gonkar Gyatso, has created a fully immersive and community-minded installation that asks viewers to engage the space through sound, taste, feel, and sight. This paper analyzes this shrine construction – an assemblage of Buddhist “kitsch” including electric prayer wheels and brightly lit Buddha sculptures alongside images of Xi Jinping and Buddhist monks – within the context of actual shrine forms and functions within the Tibetan cultural zone. Gonkar’s work provides a lens through which we can understand the development of the role of mechanization and mass production in the creation of contemporary shrines.
Shrines in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction. Reflections on Gonkar Gyatso's "Buddha's Picnic"
22.01.2019 18:30 - 20:00
Organiser:
CIRDIS
Location:
Seminarraum 1 des Instituts für Südasien-, Tibet- und Buddhismuskunde, Spitalgasse 2, Hof 2.7, 1090 Wien
Related Files
- 2019-01-22_-_Kerin.pdf 410 KB
