India’s presidency of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization brings Buddhist heritage into the fold of the body’s multilateral dialogue
heritage
Processing and Presenting Heritage Sites: Digitally Reconstructing the Temples of Kafir Kot
How a process of scanning, rendering, and reconstructing a mysterious temple location in Pakistan provides a model for all heritage and Buddhist sites
Technology of the Three Treasures: Laser Scanning Pakistan’s Buddhist Heritage
How the FARO Laser Scanner is helping specialists and researchers push the limits of digitally reconstructing and mapping ancient Buddhist sites
The Bhamala Buddhist Complex: Buddhist Pakistan’s Treasure Trove, Part Two
Discovering the antiquities, architecture, and art of the ancient Bhamala Buddhist Complex in Pakistan
The Bhamala Buddhist Complex: Buddhist Pakistan’s Treasure Trove, Part One
Discovering the antiquities, architecture, and art of the ancient Bhamala Buddhist Complex in Pakistan
Conservation matters to China. It should be a core Chinese Buddhist concern
If one seeks to understand better the general direction of Buddhist priorities in China, clues can be found in the National Cultural Heritage Administration’s (NCHA) blueprint of preserving China’s ancient grottoes in early December last year. During the 14th Five-Year Plan (2021–25), the NCHA released its own plan that would, by 2025, result in an […]
A Circle of Buddhist Democracies: India’s Buddhist Strategy for Asia
In May’s Indian elections, PM Narendra Modi’s BJP fared considerably well, indirectly securing a mandate for its Buddhist diplomacy. This “quiet” exercise of power began several years ago in September 2015, with the Vivekananda International Foundation’s (VIF) first Samvad conference. For this event we were taken to the diplomatic enclave of Chanakyapuri in New Delhi, […]
Postcard from Raymond: Preservation at its Finest (Cave 26, Ajanta)
Of all the caves at the Ajanta complex, I found Cave 26 to be the most intricate, with the unmistakable sense of, “yes, this is it.” We were looking at the literal, physical transition between the earliest days of itinerant wanderers (sramanas) and the days of settled monastic institutions. Unlike the other caves that I felt […]
Postcard from Raymond: Entering a Sanctuary of Sanctity (Cave 2, Ajanta)
It had been about five years since I visited Ajanta, one of the oldest surviving complexes of rock-cut caves carved into the hillside. Apart from ongoing restoration work by the Archaeological Survey of India, little had changed, including the bright and sunny, humid weather and the understandably large crowds that came from all over India […]