Presence and Memory
Presence and Memory
Commemoration of the Buddha
Chapter Two examines the depicted events and scenes as expressions of religious commemoration and as promoting particular social, political, and religious hierarchies. The relationships between the main, usually sculpted, Buddha image and the painted walls created a narrative structure that encompassed the temple interior as a whole and made the Buddha present within the space and in the contemporary moment. The mural sites created a place to remember and honor the Buddha, with the sculpted and painted biographical narratives making him available to contemporary Burmese. The wall paintings illustrated what was culturally praiseworthy to the Burmese, reinforced the relevance of these things socially, and inspired people to participate in the dominant cultural discourse. In the process of doing so, the commemorative imagery demonstrated the field of merit surrounding Gotama Buddha. It memorialized his great achievement and the awakenings of the Buddhas before him, presenting them to the current audience and preserving them for future ones. However, it is the structure of the paintings within the temple layout - the disposition of the images and the selection of stories - that integrated the representations of the Buddhas into a complete unit.
Keywords: Presence, Memory, Biography, Narrative, Commemoration, Buddhism, Structure, Hierarchy
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