Arts Of Southeast Asia

The geographical region of Southeast Asia is made up of the neighbouring mainland states of Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam, and the island nations of Indonesia, the Philippines and Singapore. Arts of Southeast Asia looks at the arts of this fascinating region in the context of the historical and cultural phenomena shared by these countries and in contrast their diverse and distinct responses to common internal and external influences. The continuities and discontinuities that characterise Southeast Asia are clearly reflected in the wide array of exquisite textiles and dress, jewellery and metalwork, ceramics, woodcarving and leatherworker that make up the main corpus of Southeast Asian arts and which are illustrated in this book. Major factors include the strength of indigenous art forms and animist beliefs and the long-term influences of India, China, Europe and the Arab world, and of Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity and Islam on Southeast Asian cultural forms.