South and Southeast Asian Painting and Sculpture

The Norton Simon Museum houses a world-renowned collection of art from South and Southeast Asia that includes examples of the rich sculptural and painting traditions that developed in this region over the course of more than 2,000 years. Sculptures from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Tibet, Cambodia and Thailand are on permanent display, as are selected works from Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Burma (Myanmar), China, Vietnam and Indonesia. The collection is particularly rich in art from the Indian subcontinent, including monumental stone sculpture from the Kushan and Gupta periods and a remarkable group of Chola bronzes from southern India. A selection of paintings from northern India is often on view, as are several thangkas, or Buddhist paintings on cloth, from Tibet and Nepal. To learn more about the collection, watch the video podcast Learning to Look at Asian Art at the Norton Simon Museum.