From Singapore to Windsor Castle
This week’s title reflects the breadth of activities which have been happening at, or associated with the Society, its staff and fellows:
Donna Maree Brunero of the National University, Singapore gave a lecture on the 23rd of September on Singapore’s role as the ‘Liverpool of the east’ and its place in British maritime and imperial networks. The meeting was chaired by Dr. Weipin Tsai, Royal Holloway, and Council member of the RAS. The photo at the head of this page is an 1860s picture of Singapore towards the direction of Fort Canning showing many traditional Chinese boats in the harbour.
Alice Caselini, who is completing her PhD in Art History at the University of Chicago and is currently working with the Italian Archaeological Mission in Pakistan gave a lecture on the 26th September examining aquatic imagery found on step panels at Andan Dheri in the Swat Valley. These she interpreted as being part of a specific iconographic program related to metaphors of water crossing leading the devotee to nirvana. The meeting was chaired by Professor Susan Whitfield, University of East Anglia, and Council member of the RAS.
Having virtually moved from Singapore to Pakistan, today, Friday 4 October, Dr Liz Driver will take us to India in her lecture, Reasons for Tod’s dismissal as Political Agent in the Western Rajput States 1818-1822. The talk will aim to re-assess Tod’s role as Political Agent in the Western Rajput States for the brief period 1818-1822 and to determine what went wrong. It will address Tod’s visit to Maharaja Man Singh in Jodhpur but the focus will be on the events in Kotah in 1820-21. It will draw on Tod’s own account in the Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan and on the, often vituperative, correspondence between Tod and his immediate superior, Sir David Ochterlony, and with the government in Calcutta. You can attend in person at the Society’s premises or online by contacting Matty Bradley on mb@royalasiaticsociety.org.
We will stay with the Society’s lectures for a little longer, to inform that the lecture due to take place on Tuesday 8 October has had to be postponed. Winner of the 2023 Surya P. Subedi Prize, Mark Liechty, was due to lecture on the use of hydropower in Nepal. Unfortunately, he is no longer able to attend and the lecture will hopefully be rescheduled for a future date.
However, we are pleased to announce that the lecture for Thursday 10 October will still take place when we will be delighted to welcome Marcus Milwright who will talk on Writing Art History as Fiction: A Story of Islamic Art. Published at the end of 2023, A Story of Islamic Art charts the history of Islamic art and architecture through fifty case studies, the first dating to 660 and the last to 2020. The chosen objects and buildings encompass a broad range of dynasties and regions, with each chapter set in a different location. The talk will describe the diverse inspirations for the book and the decisions taken during the processes of research and writing. The conclusion offers reflections on the potential pitfalls of presenting speculative reconstructions of historical events and the motivations and attitudes of past cultures.
From Islamic Art we now travel along the Silk Roads. Professor Susan Whitfield, expert on the Silk Roads, appeared on the BBC Radio 4 programme, Start the Week, on Monday 30 September. She spoke alongside the historian, William Dalrymple, and the new Head of Visual Arts at the Barbican, Shanay Jhaveri in the programme entitled, Ancient India and China: from golden to silk roads. Here is what the BBC Sounds website says about the programme:
“The best-selling historian William Dalrymple presents India as the great superpower of ancient times in The Golden Road: How Ancient India Transformed the World. He argues that for more than a millennium India art, religions, technology, astronomy, music and mathematics spread far and wide from the Red Sea to the Pacific, and its influence was unprecedented, but now largely forgotten. China’s significance has long been celebrated and understood, with reference to the ancient trading routes linking the east and west.
“The historian Susan Whitfield is an expert on the Silk Roads. She talks to Adam Rutherford about the extraordinary discovery of manuscripts in a cave in Dunhuang, in Northern China, which provide a detailed picture of the vibrant religious and cultural life of the town. An exhibition of the manuscripts, A Silk Road Oasis: Life in Ancient Dunhuang, runs at the British Library until 23rd February 2025. But what of India’s cultural and artistic influence and expression in modern times?
“Shanay Jhaveri is the new Head of Visual Arts at the Barbican and curator of their new exhibition, The Imaginary Institution of India: Art 1975-1998 (October 2024 until January 2025). This landmark group show explores the way artists have responded to a period of significant political and social change in India in the 20th century.
“Producer: Katy Hickman.”
If you missed the programme and would like to listen, it can be accessed here.
After spending all this time exploring Asia, how does Windsor Castle deserve its place in the title of the blogpost? On Friday 27th September, our Librarian, Edward Weech attended a conference there. Here is a short report:
Last week, our Librarian Edward Weech attended a meeting of the South East Asia Library Group (SEALG), held at Windsor Castle, which was hosted by colleagues at the Royal Collection Trust. SEALG is an organization for librarians, archivists, and curators working with South East Asia-related collections, which brings together professionals from across the UK and further afield to foster co-operation and co-ordination in the provision of services and collections. The meeting provided a good opportunity to hear how colleagues elsewhere are promoting the care and accessibility of their South East Asian collections, particularly through digitization and exhibition, and working with local and global audiences.
The Society has important holdings of books, archives, photos, and especially manuscripts from South East Asia, particularly in its Malay, Indonesian, and Burmese collections. Many of these have been digitized and are available online via the RAS Digital Library. We plan to make more available in the future. SEALG is one of several groups for librarians and other information professionals promoting awareness of UK collections for the study of different parts of Asia, with other groups including the South Asia Archive and Library Group and the Middle East Libraries Committee. To find out more about SEALG, you can visit their website.
We hope that you’ve enjoyed this roundup of recent activities. More information about our upcoming events can be found on our website and recordings of past events are available on our YouTube channel.
Nancy Charley, 4 October 2024.