Museum of Art

January 21 – March 27, 2027

Drawn from the Bates College Museum of Art’s permanent collection, The Dragon Bridge to Heaven: Yao Shamanic Art  features shamanic artworks from the Yao people, a minority ethnic group located throughout Southeast Asia. The exhibition includes ritual books, shamans’ vestments, crowns and masks, weapon rattles, spirit money stamps, and scrolls. These desacralized objects were once the ritual implements of Yao Daoist priests, who employed them in rites ranging from protecting homes against evil spirits to restoring spiritual health.

The exhibition is curated by Dr. Trian Nguyen, Associate Professor of Art and Visual Culture and the Luce Junior Professor of Asian Studies at Bates College. Nguyen holds a Ph.D. in Asian art history from the University of California, Berkeley, and obtained his Master of Theological Studies at Harvard Divinity School. While Nguyen’s primary research work situates Buddhist art and architecture within the religious, political, and social conditions of Southeast Asian culture, his work also focuses on Vietnamese art. He is currently working on a book about Vietnamese portrait sculpture from the 15th through the 19th centuries.

Curated by Dr. Trian Nguyen, Associate Professor of Art and Visual Culture and the Luce Junior Professor of Asian Studies at Bates College, with Education Curator Anthony Shostak, the exhibition and related programming are made possible with funding from the Morris David Dorenfeld Foundation.