Chakshudana or Opening the Eyes

Chakshudana or Opening the Eyes PDF

Author: Pika Ghosh

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-09-20

Total Pages: 392

ISBN-13: 1000986071

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Chakshudana or rituals of opening the eyes are practiced across multiple South Asian communities by artists, sculptors, and priests. The ritual offers gods access to the mortal world. This practice, applied to the study of material and visual culture, offers a distinctive perspective to interrogate the complex engagements with paintings, sculptures, found objects, fragments, built environments, and ecologies. This volume takes the process of seeing as its focus—to look closely, remaining true to the object, but also to see widely—from multiple subjective stances and diverse bodily engagements such as walking to dreaming, glancing to looking askance, hypnotic stares, and to see beyond the visible. It examines art history through nuanced considerations of materiality, aesthetics, and regional specificities. The essays emerge from current research that builds on the contributions of Michael W. Meister, W. Norman Brown Distinguished Professor of History of Art and South Asia Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, whose works laid the foundations for the study of South Asian visual and material culture. The essays in this book underscore methodological resonances rather than privileging conventional categories of media or chronology, exploring artistic media including temples and paintings as well as Bengali-quilted textiles, manuscript ‘lozenges,’ and metal repousse. This volume, part of the Visual Media and Histories Series, will be of interest to students and researchers of history of art, religious studies, and history as well as the allied disciplines of anthropology and folklore studies. Chapter 2 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.

A Treatise on God Written in Armenian by Eznik of Kołb (floruit C.430-c.450)

A Treatise on God Written in Armenian by Eznik of Kołb (floruit C.430-c.450) PDF

Author: Eznik (Koghbatsʻi, Bishop of Bagrewand)

Publisher: Peeters Publishers

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 252

ISBN-13: 9789042900134

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The conversion of Armenia is traditionally dated to 314 when Gregory the Illuminator (c. 240-332) baptized King Trdat (298-330) and the royal family. Not until the fifth century did there develop both a Christian literature for Armenians in the Armenian languages, and the beginnings of a literary tradition in several genres which provided a coherent argument against the old religion of Zoroastrianism and made for the creation of Armenia as a Christian nation. Eznik of Kolb, later bishop of Bagrewand, studied in Edessa and in Constantinople among that first generation of Armenian Christians who made available in the newly established Armenian script translations of Greek and Syriac texts, including the Bible and other early Christian writings. Eznik composed a treatise of theology and apologetic in Armenian which has survived untitled in one manuscript. Modern editors and translators have titled this treatise On God or Against the Sects. Eznik addressed perceived threats to Christianity in Armenia from heretical and non-Christian movements, among them Valentinian Gnosticism and the schools of Greek philosophy, Marcionism, Manichaeism and Zoroastrian Zurvanism. Eznik's sources include the Bible; ancient Greek, non-Christian literature; earlier Greek patristic treatises and other works; Syriac patristic texts; and Iranian works either written or oral, concerning the Zurvanite form of Zoroastrianism and Armenian paganism. The central concern of the book is to contrast the monotheistic Christian God with the dualistic or polytheistic deities and religions of his opponents. Eznik's book is unusual in several aspects. It is the first apologetic treatise composed in Armenian, and it also provides a summary of early Christian doctrine as Eznik understood it. It contains unique information on the fifth-century teachings of Zurvanism and Marcionism. It attests to an Armenian theology conversant with both Syriac and Greek sources. It also opens a window into pre-Christian Armenian mythology and folklore. The English translation is based on the critical edition of Louis Maries and Charles Mercier.

South Side Venus

South Side Venus PDF

Author: Mary Ann Cain

Publisher: Northwestern University Press

Published: 2018-10-15

Total Pages: 216

ISBN-13: 0810137968

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The extraordinarily productive life of curator, artist, and activist Margaret Burroughs was largely rooted in her work to establish and sustain two significant institutions in Chicago: the South Side Community Art Center (SSCAC), founded in 1940, and the DuSable Museum of African American History, founded in her living room in 1961. As Mary Ann Cain's South Side Venus: The Legacy of Margaret Burroughs reveals, the primary motivations for these efforts were love and hope. Burroughs was spurred by her love for Chicago's African American community—largely ill served by mainstream arts organizations—and by her hope that these new, black-run cultural centers would welcome many generations of aspiring artists and art lovers. This first, long–awaited biography of Burroughs draws on interviews with peers, colleagues, friends, and family, and extensive archival research at the DuSable Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Chicago Public Library. Cain traces Burroughs's multifaceted career, details her work and residency on Chicago's South Side, and highlights her relationships with other artists and culture makers. Here, we see Burroughs as teacher and mentor as well as institution builder. Anchored by the author's talks with Burroughs as they stroll through her beloved Bronzeville, and featuring portraits of Burroughs with family and friends, South Side Venus will enlighten anyone interested in Chicago, African American history, social justice, and the arts.

A Practical Guide to Arts-related Research

A Practical Guide to Arts-related Research PDF

Author: Maggi Savin Baden

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2014-11-27

Total Pages: 175

ISBN-13: 9462098158

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This book outlines the principles and practices of arts-related inquiry and provides both suggestions about conducting research in the field as well as case study examples. The ideas presented here have emerged from the authors’ own experiences of undertaking arts-related research and the challenges of implementing these approaches. The book therefore draws on personal research, practice and experience to address the concerns academics increasingly appear to be voicing about developing the scholarship and practice of arts-related research. There is a need for greater attention to, and clarity on, issues of theoretical positioning, methodology and methods when conducting robust and reputable arts-related research, which this book provides.

Artful Virtue: The Interplay of the Beautiful and the Good in the Scottish Enlightenment

Artful Virtue: The Interplay of the Beautiful and the Good in the Scottish Enlightenment PDF

Author: Leslie Ellen Brown

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-03-09

Total Pages: 284

ISBN-13: 1317178335

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During the Scottish Enlightenment the relationship between aesthetics and ethics became deeply ingrained: beauty was the sensible manifestation of virtue; the fine arts represented the actions of a virtuous mind; to deeply understand artful and natural beauty was to identify with moral beauty; and the aesthetic experience was indispensable in making value judgments. This book reveals the history of how the Scots applied the vast landscape of moral philosophy to the specific territories of beauty - in nature, aesthetics and ethics - in the eighteenth century. The author explores a wide variety of sources, from academic lectures and institutional record, to more popular texts such as newspapers and pamphlets, to show how the idea that beauty and art made individuals and society more virtuous was elevated and understood in Scottish society.

Artful Armies, Beautiful Battles

Artful Armies, Beautiful Battles PDF

Author: Pia F. Cuneo

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 9789004115880

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"Readership: All those interested in the history of art, warfare, and politics in the early modern period, including graduate students, academics, and institutes focused on early modern history and culture."--BOOK JACKET.