Envisioning Asia advocates new topics, methods and approaches in writing and thinking about Asian art. Instead of defining this art as a collection of museum masterpieces and great 'monuments' -- symbols of an alien and bygone tradition -- it encourages fresh analyses of a wide range of manufactured images, for example the city, architecture, photography, painting, cinema, television, performances and prints, and hopes to dissolve the boundaries of these genres. Dissatisfied with pure descriptions of art objects and discourses on 'intrinsic' aesthetic values -- two tendencies that have shaped traditional art history -- this series explores the production, use, reception and interrelationship in well-defined historical situations. Questioning an 'objective' Asian art history, it recognizes the self-identity of the historian shaped by ethnicity, nationality or gender: it is through particular eyes that Asia is envisioned. Book jacket.