Situated in a bustling area of Nara City, the Nan’endo (Southern Round Hall) is an eight-sided structure at Kofukuji temple. The history of the Nan’endo began in the ninth century and has been linked to the prominent Northern Fujiwara clan. This talk explores the interplay between memory and materiality, examining the process in which memory of the Northern Fujiwara clan became identified with the Nan’endo and was transformed and reshaped along with the history of the hall from the ninth to the eleventh century.

It analyzes how visual production and memorial rituals at the site expressed religious piety, marked kinship relationships and created memories of ancestors as well as narratives of family history. Attention is also given to setsuwa tales of the Nan'endo and replications of the building, which indicate the transformation of the site into a miraculous space. While derived from Buddhist devotion, such a transformation manifests an ever-changing familial “memoryscape” that was framed in and embodied by the hall and its images.

Yen-Yi Chan is currently a Robert and Lisa Sainsbury Fellow at the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures. She obtained her Ph.D. from the University of Kansas in 2018. Her research is situated at the intersection of art, religion, and social history with a focus on how visual production at Buddhist sites shapes social relations, human memory, and collective identity. She is also interested in artistic exchanges between Japan and China, the reconstruction of Buddhist heritage sites, and the creation of images of “living Buddhas (shojin butsu)” in the medieval era. Yen-Yi has also worked at the National Palace Museum in Taipei, Taiwan and the Spencer Museum of Art.

Free Lecture – booking recommended
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