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Art News:
FYI
– There
is no Tibetan equivalent for the word “art” as it is known in the
West. The closest approximation is lha dri
pa, literally, “to draw a deity.” That premise will be explored
in the exhibition Tradition Transformed: Tibetan Artists Respond at the Crow Collection of Asian Art from
Saturday, May 21, through Sunday, September 11, 2011. Free and open to the public, the
exhibition will feature 24 works of art including paintings and alternative
media by eight Tibetan artists.
See below for the news release, and let
me know if you need anything. Thank you.
Taylor
Mayad
214.353.8976 work
214.435.7756 cell
214.352.6894
fax
taylor@mayadpr.com
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CROW
COLLECTION OF ASIAN ART PRESENTS TRADITION
TRANSFORMED: TIBETAN ARTISTS RESPOND, MAY
21 –
SEPTEMBER
11,
2011
Eight contemporary Tibetan artists negotiate
cultural and artistic identities while breaking
from spiritual formulas and artistic norms
DALLAS (April
15, 2011)
–
There
is no Tibetan equivalent for the word “art” as it is known in the
West. The closest approximation is lha dri
pa, literally, “to draw a deity.” That premise will be explored
in the exhibition Tradition Transformed: Tibetan Artists Respond at the Crow Collection of Asian Art from
Saturday, May 21, through Sunday, September 11, 2011. Free and open to the public, the
exhibition will feature 24 works of art including paintings and alternative
media by eight Tibetan artists.
Traditionally, neither the Tibetan
language nor the Tibetan cultural framework has recognized art for art’s
sake, and an artist’s efficacy rests in his ability to precisely replicate
an established visual language and portray the essence of a particular deity.
This puts contemporary Tibetan artists
in a precarious position: Their work is informed by Tibetan artistic traditions,
but the value of their work is judged within different boundaries and by
different standards. The contemporary Tibetan artist faces the demands of
both a global audience and a specific inheritance of formal and ideological
demands as well as a rich array of artistic tools.
The artists whose works are shown
grapple with these issues of cultural and artistic negotiation, working with
traditional forms in innovative ways. Technology, travel, displacement, and
personal artistic freedom have informed their individual responses to the
complex interaction between tradition and modernity in art and culture. Artists
Dedron, Gonkar Gyatso, Losang Gyatso, Kesang Lamdark, Tenzin Norbu, Tenzing
Rigdol, Tsherin Sherpa and Penba Wangdu were invited by co-curators Rachel
Weingeist and Becky Bloom to submit new and recent works for the exhibition
organized by the Rubin Museum of Art, New York. Specific works by the same
artists were then selected from private collections to complement these new
pieces and highlight each artist’s range.
Of the eight artists,
four were born in Tibet, three are from Nepal and one was born in India. Dedron,
Tenzin Norbu and Penba Wangdu continue to live in their Himalayan homelands,
while the others have emigrated to Europe and the United States at different
stages in their lives. Exposed to training in traditional Tibetan painting and
the strict interpretations prescribed by Buddhist religion, these artists break
from spiritual formulas and artistic norms by experimenting with alternative
media and by extracting sacred symbols from their religious context, repurposing
them for self-expression and social commentary.
Sacred and profane are
juxtaposed and rearranged in many of these works. The large Buddha in Gonkar
Gyatso’s L.A. Confidential
(2007) is filled with tiny, disarmingly colorful stickers, many of which are
icons of a modern consumer society. Dedron – the only woman featured in
the exhibition and one of a handful of Tibetan women artists – says that
her work is not a response to politics, but rather a means for raising awareness
on behalf of women and animals. Using deep brown and gold pigments found in
Tibet’s mineral-rich soil, Dedron depicts her home and concerns –
mountains, yaks, birds, nuns, clouds and women’s spheres –
conveying a sense of melancholy at
diminishing respect for the natural world.
Many of the
featured works of art strike a balance between traditional Tibetan culture and
the cultures of the artists’ adopted homelands. The Buddha in
Rigdol’s Excuse me Sir, Which Way is
to My Home? (2008), for example, is cut from a roadmap of the United States.
Traditional iconography calls for the Buddha to be tempted from his
enlightenment by women, armed attackers and self-doubt. Rather, Rigdol’s
Buddha is surrounded by temptations of the modern variety: cologne bottles, cars
and iPhones.
Tsherin Sherpa makes a case for the value of transforming
traditions in order to keep them alive. Preservation Project #1 (2009) features
the Buddha’s head and many hands formed into gestures of sacred
conversation mudras, all pressed
against the inside of a glass jar. Sherpa observes that many in his generation
have “not received a formal education on Buddhist philosophy.” They
feel disconnected from “the true essence of Buddhist practice” and
in danger of simply ritualistic performance. His painting provokes the question,
“What is being preserved?”
Tradition Transformed: Tibetan Artists
Respond was previously exhibited at the Rubin as well as the Hood Museum of
Art at Dartmouth College. Complimenting the exhibition is a 200-page, full-color, hardcover catalogue featuring the
eight artists whose works appear in Dallas, along with several other Tibetan
artists. Co-published by ArtsAsiaPacific and the Rubin Museum of Art, the
catalogue includes essays by H.G. Masters, Michael R. Sheehy and Anna Bremm and
an interview with Michael R. Sheehy and Paolo
Vanzo.
Admission is free. The Crow Collection of Asian Art
is open Tuesdays – Thursdays (10 a.m. – 9 p.m.), Fridays –
Sundays (10 a.m. – 6 p.m.) and closed on Mondays. For more information,
please go to crowcollection.org or
call 214-979-6430.
About
the Crow Collection
The
Trammell & Margaret Crow Collection of Asian Art is located
in the Arts District of downtown Dallas. The Crow Collection offers three floors
of galleries with changing exhibitions of the arts of China, Japan, India and
Southeast Asia. LinkAsia, a newly designated gallery space at the Crow
Collection is devoted to artists and media providing perspectives on
contemporary Asia. The museum offers a serene setting for quiet reflection and
shared learning throughout the galleries and in Snuff Bottle Court – the
outdoor Japanese garden at the corner of Harwood and Flora.
IMAGES AVAILABLE UPON REQUEST
###
MEDIA
CONTACT:
Taylor Mayad
cell/214-435-7756
taylor@mayadpr.com
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