Mediums and Magical Things: Statues, Paintings,
and Masks in Asian Places
Description :
Statues, paintings, and masks—lie the bodies of shamans and spirit mediums—gie material form and presence to otherwise invisible entities, and sometimes these objects are understood to be enlivened, agentive on their own terms. This book explores how magical images are expected to work with the shamans and spirit mediums who tend and use them in contemporary South Korea, Vietnam, Myanmar, Bali, and elsewhere in Asia. It considers how such things are fabricated, marketed, cared for, disposed of, and sometimes transformed into artmarket commodities and museum artifacts.