Can you be homesick for an aesthetic? Growing up Southeast Asian in a family of Chinese descent, wonder | wander | women often feel culturally deprived in our Western homes.
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| Mural of Yaoshi Fo, Buddha of medicine Metropolitan Museum of Art |
When we wanted to be surrounded by the iconography of our childhood and early adulthood, we would head for the so-called 'Asian section' of our local museums - like our own homes, a mix of mostly Eastern spiritual imagery and sculpture.
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| 'Spirit house', Cambodia |
Like medieval Christianity, traditional Southeast Asian spiritualism is full of artefacts that can serve as a focus for worship - a tangible object that aligns the worshiper to the spirit world.
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| Temple pillar, Indonesia |
In Southeast Asia the oldest and most widespread religions are Hinduism and Buddhism, which revolve around a few main deities and hundreds of minor deities - a rich visual tradition for temple architects.
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| Buddhist stele, Thailand |
People would pray to the Hindu deities and Buddhist bodhisattvas to intercede in their worship or help with their daily concerns, a little like Catholics making offerings to patron saints.
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| Buddha and bodhisattva figurines, Thailand |
We had some of these graceful bronze saints around our house and on altars, often accompanying portraits of lost loved ones.
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| Buddha and bodhisattva figurines, Thailand |
Even though we were Catholic, we burned fresh incense and left flowers and small bowls of food for Buddhist saints and our own ancestors.
Not a religion, but a way of living that combined daily life with metaphysics: Chinese beliefs involve a complicated system of alignment that combine astrology with geomancy and the cycle of life, death and rebirth.
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| Cranes flying over an immortal land, 1777 |
Animal symbols form an important part of this belief. Objects were decorated with images of 'auspicious' animals, from everyday utensils like spoons and tea bowls, to ceremonial robes worn by royalty.
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| Emperor's feast day robe with twelve symbols |
We gravitate to small precious things, decorative versions of useful objects, often in semiprecious stone. These ink palettes are made of jade and bronze, carved with poetry and images of paradise.
There was also a brush case of red lacquer decorated with bats. In Chinese symbolism, the bat means good fortune, because its name in Chinese (fú) literally sounds like the word for fortune.
Our favourite was a little jade goat that may have been a paperweight or an ornament for a seal.
A feast for the soul and the senses and also a trip in time - we look forward to being able to see our favourite galleries again in a safer time!
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