[INDOLOGY] Gandhāra Corpora Lecture Series: CHRISTIAN LUCZANITS, "Revisiting the Bodhisattva Maitreya in Gandhāran Art" April 2, 2026

[Charles DiSimone]

Dear Friends,

I am pleased to announce the next talk in the Gandhāra Corpora Lecture
Series, which will also be a talk in the Spring 2026 Permanent Training in
Buddhist Studies of the Ghent Centre for Buddhist Studies.

Title:
"Revisiting the Bodhisattva Maitreya in Gandhāran Art"
Speaker:
*Dr. Christian Luczanits*, SOAS, University of London

Timing:
Thursday, April 2 @ 17.00 CET

Location:
Locaal 3.30 - Camelot
Blandijn, Campus Boekentoren
9000 Gent, Belgium
(also online)

Abstract:
In my presentation, I will return to a topic that has interested me since
my student days, namely the depictions and roles of the Bodhisattva and
future Buddha Maitreya in Gandhāran art. I have covered some aspects of
this topic in previous work, in particular in my contribution on narrative
reliefs with a flask-holding Bodhisattva to the 2005 volume of East and
West dedicated to Maurizio Taddei, and since have an unfinished monograph
on the subject on my virtual desk.
This time, I will revisit my earlier ideas on the subject in light of more
recent publications. Among other topics, I will consider the origin of
Maitreya, his designation as Buddha in early inscriptions, the concepts of
Maitreya’s paradises, Ketumatī and Tuṣita, as potential precursors of Pure
Land Buddhism, and Maitreya as a Bodhisattva representing the brahmanic
caste.

Bio:
Christian Luczanits is David L. Snellgrove Senior Lecturer in Tibetan and
Buddhist Art at SOAS. His primary research areas are early Buddhist art
during and after the Kushana period (1st to 5th centuries) and early
Tibetan Buddhist art (7th to 15th centuries) within its wider context.
Recent research has centered around an AHRC-funded project on “Tibetan
Buddhist Monastery Collections Today”, in particular the documentation and
assessment of monastery collections in Mustang, Nepal, and Ladakh, India.

All are welcome. The Gandhāra Corpora Lecture Series is in-person and
hybrid online. Please register for the series through this Google Form:
https://forms.gle/TwffQCPuVipUpMvk6
(registering once will ensure you will receive links to all future talks in
the series)

Please note some additional talks in the series scheduled in the next weeks

April 22 @17.00 CET
*Daniel Stuart*: "The Contours of Paradise: Pleasure Gardens and
Figurations of the Self in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three"

April 30 @17.00 CET
*Samara Broglia de Moura*: “New archaeological data on the extension of the
Kushan empire and post-Kushan groups in the Himalayan range”

and more to come!

Friendly Greetings,
Charles DiSimone

Prof. Dr. Charles DiSimone
Associate Professor of Buddhist Studies & Indology
Department of Languages and Cultures
Ghent University
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