A Travelling Art Exhibit in honor of Mongolia's 800th Anniversary

The year 2006 marks the 800th anniversary of Mongolian statehood. In honor of the occasion, the Zanabazar Mongolia National Museum (ZMNM) has generously consented to allow The America-Mongolia Friendship Society to bring a touring exhibit of their Mongolian Buddhist masterpieces to the West. The exhibit will travel to approximately ten venues between 2006 and 2009, showing in each for a period of six to twelve weeks.

The working title of the show, “Portals to Shangri-La: Masterpieces from Buddhist Mongolia,” focuses on Mongolia’s image of itself as a portal to the mystical land of Shambala, the source of Hilton’s concept of Shangri-La. Thus we will bring artworks that the Mongolian masters considered to be tunnels or portals to a higher reality.

Portals to Shangri-La: Masterpieces from Buddhist Mongolia is composed of seventy-five wonders of traditional Mongolian art, dated between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries, the period in which Mongolian art achieved its deepest flowering.

These will be of various mediums, from tangka paintings to bronzes. These are in the following categories:--

Standard temple tangka watercolors, referred to by Tucci and others as “painted scrolls.” We include approximately thirty of these, each a masterpiece embodying Mongolia’s unique artistic heritage. Most are framed in traditional silk brocades, and can be hung as is on museum walls. For those not in traditional brocade frames, we have created traditional Mongolian “shadow box” frames that can be assembled and disassembled at each exhibit.

Extra large temple tangkas. We are bringing three of these, perhaps the most spectacular being the six foot watercolor (mineral pigment) of the female Buddha Tara.

Applique and embroidery tangkas. The Mongolians arguably had Asia’s highest form of “appliqué buddhas” or tangkas made by means of silk appliqué. Our large six foot portrait of Tsangnyon Heruka perhaps best typifies this exquisite art form. In addition to three appliqué masterpieces, we include three exquisite eighteenth century “embroidery” buddhas.

Statues. The Mongolians became great masters of sculpture. In fact Lama Zanabazaar, the monk forefather of modern Mongolia, is considered to have been one of the greatest sculpturors and painters in Asian history. The Mongols worked in various mediums, from bronze and other metals, to wood, ceramic, and even paper mache. We are including a dozen masterpiece bronzes and one paper mache. One of these is by Lama Zanabazaar himself, and another by one of his principal students. Connoisseurs of Buddhist bronzes will delight in the fourteenth century Tara, a priceless masterpiece.

Gher altar tangkas. Almost all Mongolians traditionally were nomads, from the king on down. A wonderful tradition of gher or yurt (i.e., tent) altar tangka emerged. We are including approximately a dozen of these unique paintings.

Personal miniature tangkas. Mongolia also developed an amazing tradition of personal portable tangka, known as “burchan.” We include a half dozen masterpieces. Also, just for fun, we have included a group of a half dozen personal miniatures of various buddha forms in wonderfully sexy postures. Of course, the paintings are also masterpieces, so the “just for fun” is not entirely frivolous.

Ritual implements and temple dance masks. Ritual implements and temple dance masks became an art form in and of themselves. Here we include several examples of how artists strove to express their genius in these practical forms.

The exhibit is a cooperative project between the Zanabazar Mongolia National Fine Arts Museum in Ulan Bataar and the America Mongolia Cultural Heritage Group. It has been curated by Glenn H. Mullin, with Khaidav Mijidiin and N. Oyuntegsh, the chief conservator and chief curator respectively of the Zanabazar Mongolia National Fine Arts Museum.

Glenn is the author of twenty-five books on Central Asian culture (see www.glennmullin.com), and has curated numerous art exhibits for various institutes, including the Dalai Lama exhibit that opened in Atlanta in 1996 in honor of the ‘96 Summer Olympics. He is a founder of the America-Mongolia Friendship Society (Atlanta, GA., USA), and has curated numerous Asian exhibits in the past, two of which were funded by the Rubin Museum of Art in New York. His books include The Mystical Arts of Tibet (Longstreet Press); The Female Buddhas in Tibetan Mystical Art (Clear Light Publications); The Fourteen Dalai Lamas (Clear Light Publications); and The Flying Mystics of Tibetan Buddhism (presently in the press with Serindia).

The accompanying reader will be written by Glenn Mullin, with a foreword by Khaidav Mijidiin. It will be approx 112 pages in length, and will be made available to hosting institutions at fifty percent of the cover cost ($19.95 in paperback; $29.95 hardback) plus shipping.

Between showings the exhibit will be stored in the Oglethorpe University Museum of Art, Atlanta. OUMA and the Mongolia Society will delegate the responsibility of handling the check list.

Because the exhibit is on loan in honor of Mongolia’s 800th statehood anniversary, we have attempted to make it as affordable as possible. Therefore the rental fee on the exhibit inside the USA is only $5,000 for a six week period. This amount goes to the Museum in Mongolia. On top of this there is a $3,500 administrative and transportation fee. Individual institutions must also cover the cost of insurance while the exhibit is with them on their premises, and the cost of shipping from OUMA in Atlanta.