- Publisher
- Thames & Hudson
- Published
- 1967
- Shelf
- culture: Southeast Asia
- ISBN
- Out of print
Southeast Asia
The Art of Southeast Asia
Philip Rawson
Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, Laos, Burma, Java and Bali in one volume. The region read as a conversation rather than a set of borders.
Why read it
Rawson traces how Indian religious form arrives by sea and is then rebuilt locally into something neither Indian nor identical from one kingdom to the next. Angkor, Borobudur and the Thai Buddha stop being separate wonders and become moves in the same long argument about how to build a cosmos.
Why own it
It is the survey that still frames the region for most readers, and it stays in demand secondhand because nothing has replaced it at the size. Worth owning as the map you consult before any of the monographs make sense.
Who it is for
Anyone working with Southeast Asian motifs, architecture or ornament.
Opens a search on AbeBooks, a network of independent and antiquarian sellers, which is where a good part of this shelf has to be found, because it is out of print.
Read next
Chosen because they argue with this one, not because a machine noticed they share a category.
