June 2022 Conference

PANELS

Embodiment
 
What can visual material tell us about Buddhist conceptions of embodiment and one’s experience with the world? Traditionally, an embodied individual locates its subjectivity vis a vis a perceived internal, thinking self and its relationship to a given external other. This engagement is facilitated through both the sensori-motor functions of the body responding to external stimuli and the reciprocal imposition of social and cultural factors onto those interactions. Buddhism, however, rejects fundamentally the paradigm of a fixed, eternal self, positing instead that a sentient being exists as a continuum of material and mental processes. Given this notion of the no-self and the concomitant rejection of gender as a fixed category, how might studies of Buddhist artifacts directly engage theories of gender fluidity, queerness, and the performative and constructed aspects of gender? 
 
With this question in mind, this panel addresses the ways in which visual material participated in historical discourses on the nature embodied experience and the status of body types in the Buddhist soteriological project. How is the perfected body visually represented? How do images, sculptural works, and other media engage with the body, or transform the body of both subject and viewer? Do visual materials complicate or contradict textually defined bodies?
 
Patronage
 
While keeping in mind the complexities of high-level Buddhist notions of gender identity, as explored in Panel 1, this panel examines women as historical actors through the lens of patronage. There has been considerable scholarship on female practices and roles in commissioning Buddhist artifacts. Notable studies in Chinese history, for example, have approached this subject through the perspective of cakravartin legitimacy in the rulership of Empresses Dowager Ling and Wu Zetian, or through the popular patronage of Guanyin, most recently in the work of Yuhang Li. Moreover, scholars of Japanese studies and art history have undertaken significant research into the patronage of courtly elite and nunneries. In these contexts, the commissioning of artwork was conceived as a way of accruing merit while simultaneously circumventing, or overcoming obstructions to spiritual perfection. Were artifacts necessarily commissioned by women with this reconciliation in mind? What can we surmise from these artworks about attitudes regarding artmaking and soteriology that are not preserved in writing? How does this compare across Asia? What can we glean from donor images and dedications on these commissioned works? Finally, how do religious artifacts enrich our understanding of women’s roles in society, their social networks and lineal concerns, and help us problematize the notion of female “agency”? 
 
The Sacred Feminine
 
Worship of the female/feminine/femininity has a place in most any religious tradition. Buddhism specifically has relied on the worship of Buddhas or Bodhisattvas identified as female and vested with important attributes, notably transcendent wisdom and longevity. In some Buddhist traditions, such as the Vajrayana as developed in India, the female becomes central to both worldly practice and ritual, in addition to conceptions of the sacred. While central to Buddhist practices that championed what were perceived as feminine traits, the female as the focal point of eschatological rites appears to run counter to the celebration of the female or womanhood. Earlier scholarship sought both to critique androcentric biases in gendered representations, and to argue for representations of the feminine divine as a source of empowerment for female viewers. While not denying the importance of women’s search for the sacred “in her own image,” nor the mark of patriarchy on the representation of the female divine, this panel seeks to question these premises and explore different frameworks. Within the symbolism of the deity as mother, for example, what is the role of the biological mother? Can motherhood be conceptualized as transcending gender categories? How might non-essentialist notions of gender be applied to representations of the goddess or female deity?
 
These differences in the ways in which gendered representation is emphasized thus depend on the ritual or meditation context to which visual representations of female divinities relate. As such, portrayals of the divine woman depict a spectrum of qualities, the female being auspicious, sexual, lively, violent, grotesque, or even putrefying. Fundamentally, the contradicting negative and positive portrayals of the female body in text and image alike reject the applicability of a straightforward or universal understanding of gender in the Buddhist world. Are these female or feminized personas constructed from male or female viewpoints, or both? How might the sacred female in visual representations confirm or challenge the presence of misogynistic attitudes as interpreted by scholars of doctrine? How do gendered qualities reflect the worldly realities and divine aspirations of those who developed and represented visually these personas?