Two new galleries of Asian Art at the Museum of Fine Arts of Boston

Two new galleries are set to open at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (USA), this month. One, focused on Rajput painting, has been opened on December 10 and the other, which will be inaugurated tomorrow, will celebrate rare sculptural works from India and neighboring countries (South Asia) and Southeast Asia. 

The gallery focused on Asian sculpture will highlight, through 120 works, the artistic traditions of India and the surrounding South Asian countries of Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, as well as Southeast Asia, which includes Indonesia, Cambodia, Burma, Thailand, and Vietnam. In addition, the gallery will emphasize the important cultural exchange that took place between the two geographic regions during the course of two millennia. Many of the objects on view have recently been conserved and will be displayed in new cases and on new mounts to enhance their presentation.

There will be sculptures of Hindu and Buddhist goddesses at the entrance of the gallery. Two 11th-century bronze statues (approximately 3 feet tall) greet visitors- the Great Goddess of Hinduism from India shown with curving, sinuous gestures, and a more restrained and formally posed Cambodian Buddhist deity -which reflect the different yet related conventions for depicting female figures. Juxtapositions of this kind appear throughout the gallery, organized chronologically, to encourage comparisons between works in pairs and groups.  

Location: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Avenue of the Arts. 465 Huntington Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts 02115-5523. USA.
Opening hours: Mondays and Tuesdays from 10am to 4.45pm. From Wednesday to Friday from 10am to 9.45pm. Saturdays and Sundays from 10am to 4.45pm.