Professor Michelle Wang publishes first scholarly monograph on Buddhist maṇḍalas in China

The first scholarly monograph on Buddhist maṇḍalas in China, this book examines mural paintings of the Maṇḍala of Eight Great Bodhisattvas. This iconographic template, in which a central Buddha is flanked by eight attendants, flourished during the Tibetan (786–848) and post-Tibetan Guiyijun (848–1036) periods at Dunhuang, which is located in northwestern China. A rare motif, the maṇḍala bore associations with political authority and received patronage from local rulers. Attending to the historical and cultural contexts surrounding this iconography, this book demonstrates that transcultural communication over the Silk Routes, and the religious and artistic dialogue between Chinese and Tibetan communities, were defining characteristics of the visual language of Buddhist maṇḍalas at Dunhuang.