Melodious Flute,Burmese Buddhist Statues Under The Influence Of Hinduism

Myanmar is an important country in Southeast Asia.In the long process of cultural development,Buddhist culture has gradually become the core of its development.Myanmar's Buddhist statues art has been influenced by the Hinduism statue art from the beginning.Specifically,this process can be divided into the following stages.The first stage is the 4th-10th century AD.This stage is the initial stage of Hinduism's influence on Myanmar's Buddhist art.Buddhist statues art is concentrated around the ruins of Thayekhittaya ancient city in southern part of Myanmar,with sporadic discoveries in the central region of Myanmar.From the perspective of the types of statues,Buddha is the most important subject for Buddhist statues in this period.In the early stage,the subject for Buddhist statues is more single,with few materials used,which are important features of the early Buddhist statues art in Myanmar.From the perspective of styles of statues,the early Buddhist statues are more concise,similar to Indian Sarnate style,without much decoration.The second stage is 10th-13th century AD.Statues still exist in southern Myanmar,while the Mandalay area centered on Bagan becomes the most important area of Buddhist statues in this stage,with a large number of Buddhist statues and architecture relics.In this stage,there are a larger number of subjects for statues,with more Bodhisattva figures and especially the jataka and Buddha stories become the most common subjects for statues.Due to the large number of Buddhist temple remains in Bagan City,Myanmar,architectural fresco becomes a very prominent subject for statues of this stage.In terms of specific statues,the image pattern of "short but round face" of Buddhist statues is basically formed in this stage,with more types of Buddhist statues and higher the degree of beauty than previous stage.Hinduism statues begin to comprehensively affect the specific content of Buddhist statues.The third stage is the 14th-19th century.The Buddhist statues of this stage are massively found in the northern region of Myanmar.The Buddhist statues are composed of the south,central and northern areas and main subjects are single Buddha statues,jataka stories and so on.In this stage,statues moves on the path of overelaborate decoration and the surface,structure and others of statues become important areas for expression of decorative patterns.