Seattle Art Museum - DOWNTOWN SEATTLE Silk and the Logics of Cosmopolitan Empire in Tang China BuYun Chen, Swarthmore College Commonly regarded as the golden age of Chinese history, the Tang dynasty was marked by impressive economic growth, political innovations, the flourishing of art and literature, and increased contact with the outside world. From the...

Seattle Art Museum - DOWNTOWN SEATTLE The 21st Century Silk Road: China’s Belt and Road Initiative David Bachman, University of Washington China’s Belt and Road Initiative marks a major expansion in China’s growing world in international affairs. It now includes land and maritime silk roads, an arctic silk road and a digital silk road. Much...

Seattle Art Museum - DOWNTOWN SEATTLE The Maritime Silk Road: Goods, Ships and Cultural Diversity Derek Heng, Northern Arizona University The Maritime Silk Road connected Maritime Asia through to the East Coast of Africa. The Indian Ocean and South China Sea witnessed intense and vibrant interactions for at least two thousand years. Natural products and...

Seattle Art Museum - DOWNTOWN SEATTLE Authenticity and the Reproduction of Buddhist Art and Artifacts in Medieval China Hsueh-Man Shen, New York University As Buddhism was transmitted to China, sacred objects were duplicated and replicated to satisfy the needs of local communities. Yet the replications pose a series of questions about authenticity. This lecture shows...

Seattle Art Museum - DOWNTOWN SEATTLE Zoroastrian and Manichean Arts of the Silk Roads Zsuzsanna Gulasci, Northern Arizona University Zsuzsanna Gulasci is a historian of religious arts of pan-Asiatic religions. Her talk introduces two of the religions that spread from Mesopotamia and Persia into Central Asia and China during the Silk Roads era, as well...