Topic: ISHB Zoom Lecture Winston Kyan Identity and Religion

Abstract: 

This lecture situates the architecture of the Hsi Lai Temple of Fo Guang Shan in Hacienda Heights, CA into the context of Asian American Buddhist visual culture. This lecture argues that, like many other examples of Asian American Buddhist visual culture, Hsi Lai Temple expresses religious and political identities through its visual forms and textual cues.

Bio information:

Winston Kyan is currently Associate Professor of Art History at the University of Utah. He has two main areas of research: 1) medieval Chinese Buddhist art of the Silk Roads (5thto 13th century) and 2) Asian American Buddhist visual culture (19thto 21st century). The medieval Chinese project investigates the ways in which the introduction and development of Buddhist art into medieval China impacted the representation of the body and the emotions. The Asian American project attempts to rewrite the history of American Buddhism by examining the marginalized Buddhist visual and material culture of Asian Americans.