Manjari Sihare shares details of a forthcoming symposium honoring the scholarship of renowned South and South East Asian Art Scholar, Robert L. Brown
After receiving his Ph.D. in art history from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in 1981, Robert Brown worked for several years as a curator of South and Southeast Asian art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA). In 1986 he returned to UCLA as Professor of Indian and Southeast Asian Art History. In 2001, he was reappointed as a curator at LACMA, a position that he holds concurrently with his UCLA professorship. In the same way that Robert Brown’s career has bridged the institutions of the art museum and the research university, his scholarship has also extended across various geographical boundaries and chronological periods. His research has addressed topics ranging from the visual traditions of 1st century BCE Central Asia to 20th century colonial historiography. Much of his work has focused on the Buddhist and Hindu artistic traditions that flourished during key historical periods in what are now present-day Pakistan, India, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, and Indonesia. His particular concern with the nature of artistic influence between India and Southeast Asia, and also between early Southeast Asian cultures themselves, have contributed greatly to the present understanding of artistic and cultural adaptation and exchange in these regions. His various essays, which present important perspectives on such subjects as pilgrimage, narrative, sacred space, ritual, divinity, relics, the body, miracles, and aesthetics, have also, in their interdisciplinary and cross-national emphases, provided a model of scholarship to his many students over the years. The papers in this symposium, which cover a wide range of subjects, reflect the enduring impact of Robert Brown’s teaching and intellectual generosity upon the work of his colleagues and former students. To learn more about Prof. Brown, click here.
View the symposium scheduled here.