Julia Cavallo

While the image of a Buddha is recognizable to many, its role within the Buddhist religion is more complex than it appears. Unlike the imagery of Catholicism and many other Christian religions, a Buddha image is not representative of a Buddha, but rather is a Buddha himself. The lack of separation between a living Buddha and a Buddha image makes Buddhist iconography of supreme importance within the religion. In order for an image to become living it has to be properly made, consecrated, and displayed. My artwork focuses on the elements of being properly made, specifically in Chinese Buddhism. Although there standards for what a Buddha image is supposed to look like is established in sutra texts, historical stories, and art making tradition there is still a lot of grey area that exists in the art making process that is unscripted but still somehow has to rise to meet the level of proper creation. Because the art created will ultimately become a Buddha this reality must affect the creation process of these objects. I wanted to see if I could use my knowledge of Buddhist artistic precedents, philosophy, and history to create art that would not be devotional, but made in such a way where it reflects the process of making devotional art, and demonstrates Buddhist ideals.

Through staying consistent with these “Buddhist rules” of art philosophy and history I determined acceptable design, materials, and processes for my art. Through this Independent Study I was most interested in the the simultaneous relationship of Buddhist art having to serve as a sentient presence and also an aesthetically pleasing art object at the same time. Because there is a huge variety of images available the Buddha images a Buddhist chooses comes down to personal taste. I was interested in how an artists maintains the balance between creating something that is beautiful and functional on an artistic level but also proper in respect to its representation of a Buddha.The title Thus Come is a translation from the Chinese Ru Lai, a title for the Buddha meaning that it is a process by which he arrives. It is the facilitation of this arrival that I hope to have created is in this gallery.

Julia Cavallo ‘19