Mannheim
3 October 2009
bis 21 February 2010
Asia's Cultures in Change
Through Alexander?s military campaign the peoples of Central Asia were confronted with Greek culture. And, conversely, Alexander?s army and followers came into contact with the local cultures. The lasting reciprocal effects of these encounters on the art and culture of Central Asia are a focal point of the exhibition, illustrated in their great breadth of variations.
The art of the direct successors of Alexander in Hellenistic Bactria, the Seleucids, and following these the Greco-Bactrian kings, display markedly Greek elements. Important finds derive from the Oxus Temple and from the large Hellenistic city of Ai Khanoum in present-day Afghanistan.
From the Yueshi, a rider-nomad people of the 2nd century BC who entered Central Asia from western China, evolved the influential rulers of the Kushan. The Kushan dynasty ruled Bactria for several centuries, expanding their empire beyond the Hindukush to India by the turn of the millennia.
Under these rulers an individual art form developed, which is linked unmistakably with older Oriental, Greek, nomad and Far Eastern motifs.
The peak of interchange between various lines of art was ultimately attained in the art of Gandhara, whose centre was in the eastern part of the Kushan empire in present-day Pakistan. During the first centuries AD Greek and older Oriental motifs were joined with Indian art forms as a matter of course.
With the oncome of Buddhism in Central Asia also came motifs from India and with them some of the earliest portrayals of Buddha. This revolutionary novelty in art imagery possibly derives from Greek traditions as well, in which the depiction of deities in human form was common.
