The Collective on Gender, Religion, and the Arts of Asia (GRAA) strives to create a platform for the production of new work that furthers our understanding of how gender and visual media intersect. Here, we share projects, essays, performances, and other interventions that have been seen in a GRAA-sponsored conference or workshop event. We hope to continue sharing updates as the work that GRAA highlights and features continues to grow and develop.

New Works

In her new book, Searching for the Body: A Contemporary Perspective on Tibetan Buddhist Tantra, Rae Dachille (University of Arizona, USA) illuminates a fifteenth-century Tibetan debate on a tantric ritual practice known as body mandala and demonstrates the relevance of this debate for better understanding Tibetan Buddhism as well for engaging contemporary controversies around representation and embodiment.

Ashley Thompson (School of Oriental and Africana Studies, London, UK) published an essay in May 2023 entitled "Calling the Earth to Witness" as part of the Museum of Modern Art's (MoMA) series Post: Notes on Art in a Global Context. The essay discusses questions of colonial histories and gender as they relate to Letters from Panduranga, a film by Hanoi-based filmmaker Nguyễn Trinh Thi. Ashley's essay was accompanied by screenings of select clips from Nguyễn's film.