Panda Sunset

Panda Sunset

Image by lovenichero

Panda Sunset

Image by lovenichero

asia for a white man(Hong Kong/Kowloon 2008)

Image by tommy the pariah[away]
Hong Kong,2008 An explosion of inputs and scents :)

Welcome Lisa to Invo!

Image by juhansonin
Lisa is a recovering Manhattan'ite who is summer interning at Invo.
She is a storyteller, graphic designer, and photographer.

Lisa was a media producer at the New York Times for eight years covering stories such as the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, the Asian tsunami, Hurricane Katrina, the Haitian earthquake, and the past two presidential elections. She escaped the city and is halfway through her master's degree in Digital Design and Media at the Rhode Island School of Design in Providence, RI. She will finish her MFA in May 2013. Lisa is a classically-trained photographer with an undergraduate degree from the Pratt Institute in New York.

She is currently working on the hGraph and Flourish projects.

Welcome aboard!

NYC - Metropolitan Museum of Art - Dainichi Nyorai and the Guardian King of the Four Directions

Image by wallyg
Dainichi Nyorai (Mahavairocana)
Heian period (794-1185), 12th century
Wood with gold leaf and lacquer decoration
Rogers Fund, 1926 (26. 118)

Guardian Kings of the Four Directions
Heian period (794-1185), 12th century
Wood with traces of color
The Harry G.C. Packard Collection of Asian Art, Gift of Harry G.C. Packard, and Purchase, Fletcher, Rogers, Harris Brisbane Dick, and Louis V. Bell Funds. Joseph Pulitzer Bequest and The Anneberg Fund Inc. Gift, 1975 (1975.268.164, 165)

In Buddhist temples, images of the Buddha are venerated on altars that represent Mount Sumeru, considered to be the center of the mythic Indian universe. An alcove recessed in the ceiling above transforms into architecture the parsol or canopy that sheltered persons of high estate. Hanging ornaments refer to floral garlands worn by the elite and bestowed in veneration on sacred images.

This altar--a railed rectangular wooden platform backed by a planked wall between two pillars--represents a Japanese style of Buddhist architecture. It is a replica of the altar at a twelth century Amida Hall at Fuki-ji in K yushi built in 1986 using traditional material and techniques by the Kyoto firm Yasui Kamokuten, under the direction of architectural historian Kakichi Suzuki. At its center is the golden image of Dainichi Nyori, the supreme Buddha of the cosmos in esoteric Buddhist thought. He is the source from whom all other deities and everything in the universe emanate, as light does from the sun. His hands form the mystic gesture (mudra) of perfect knowledge, which holds the powe to restrain passions that hinder enlightenment. With the left index finger surrounded and protected by the fingers of the right, this gesture expresses the all-encompassing union of the spiritual and material realms of being. At one time the sculpture also had a crown over the topknot adorned with images of five Buddhas, representing Dainchi's five forms. In keeping with the occult nature of this image, mystery and introspection suffuse its features. Graceful proportions made possible by a new technique of carving and assembling sculpture in sections are characteristic of images of the later Heain period, when courtly aesthetics were paramount. In the glow of its original gold-leaf covering, this Dainichi must have appeared to embody his name, the Buddha of the Great Raddiance of Illumination.

Standing sentinel at the corners of the platform are two armored figures of menacing mien. They are from a set of the Guarrdian Kings of the Four Directions, Hindu demigods who were absorbed into the Buddhist pantheon as protectors of the teaching. Their stocky figures retain the massive strength of an early Heian style and were carved from single blocks of wood. Only the arms, now missing, were carved separately.

**
The Metropolitan Museum of Art's permanent collection contains more than two million works of art from around the world. It opened its doors on February 20, 1872, housed in a building located at 681 Fifth Avenue in New York City. Under their guidance of John Taylor Johnston and George Palmer Putnam, the Met's holdings, initially consisting of a Roman stone sarcophagus and 174 mostly European paintings, quickly outgrew the available space. In 1873, occasioned by the Met's purchase of the Cesnola Collection of Cypriot antiquities, the museum decamped from Fifth Avenue and took up residence at the Douglas Mansion on West 14th Street. However, these new accommodations were temporary; after negotiations with the city of New York, the Met acquired land on the east side of Central Park, where it built its permanent home, a red-brick Gothic Revival stone "mausoleum" designed by American architects Calvert Vaux and Jacob Wrey Mold. As of 2006, the Met measures almost a quarter mile long and occupies more than two million square feet, more than 20 times the size of the original 1880 building.

In 2007, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was ranked #17 on the AIA 150 America's Favorite Architecture list.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art was designated a landmark by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission in 1967. The interior was designated in 1977.

National Historic Register #86003556