Realms of the Dharma: LACMA exhibit

Realms of the Dharma: Buddhist Art Across Asia

Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) 

LACMA has an excellent permanent collection.

"Realms of the Dharma: Buddhist Art Across Asia" presents an international survey of Buddhism and Buddhist art, beginning with the religion’s origins in India and following its spread through mainland and island Southeast Asia (Burma, Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Indonesia), the Himalayas (Kashmir, Nepal, and Tibet), and East Asia (China, Korea, and Japan).

Buddhism Friendship Scholarship Program goes to LACMA

Incorporating 180 masterpieces of pan-Asian Buddhist art, the exhibition introduces key concepts of Buddhist thought and practice viewed through the prism of rare and extraordinarily beautiful Buddhist sculptures, paintings, and ritual objects.

Drawn from LACMA’s permanent collection, with several significant loans from private collections, the exhibition explores:

• the life of the historical Buddha,
• the role of the bodhisattva or Buddhist savior,
• Buddhist cosmology,
• and such key concepts as Dharma, karma, nirvana, mantra, mudra, and mandala.

The show focuses on art associated with such key phases of Buddhism as Theravada (early monastic Buddhism), Mahayana (the “Great Vehicle” populism), Vajrayana (the “Diamond Vehicle”—tantric or esoteric Buddhism), and Chan (Zen).

While closed on the Day of the Dead, the exhibit reopens along with the museum on Nov. 2, 2025, and continues until July 12, 2026. Ticket purchase necessary. Discounted for members.

• Realms of the Dharma: Buddhist Art Across Asia | LACMA
• Realms of the Dharma: Buddhist Art Across Asia at LACMA — Art of The Ancestors | Island Southeast Asia, Oceania, and Global Tribal Art News
• At LACMA, splendid Buddhist art goes on view after years of delay | Los Angeles Times