Nepal

By Camden Smith

Formally known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, located in South Asia, Nepal is landlocked by India, Peoples Republic of China, and the Tibetan Autonomous Region. Located in the Himalayas, Nepal contains eight of the world’s tallest mountains including is the world’s tallest mountain Mt. Everest. The Kingdom of Nepal was declared in 1768, continuing as a monarchy throughout most of history until a decade long Civil War by the Communist Party of Nepal which consisted of several weeks of mass protests by all major political parties and led to the 12 point agreement of November 22, 2005. This led to the establishment of a federal multiparty representative democratic republic. Two months later, on July 24th, 2008 the first president of Nepal, Ram Baran Yadav, was elected and is still the current and only President to date. 1996 Marked the beginning of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), whose plan was to overthrow the Monarchy with a people's socialist republic. This lead to the Nepal Civil War, which lasted over a decade and lead to more than 12,000 deaths. On June 1st 2001, during the Civil War, the Nepalese Royal Massacre took place. Being one of the most tragic events in Nepal’s history, King Birendra, Queen Aiswarya, and seven other members of the royal family were killed. The murderer was the oldest son, Dipendra Shah Dev**, ** and also the Royal Crown Prince to the throne. Shortly after the massacre the son attempted to committed suicide, failed to do so, but then died three days later. There has been many theories as to if the Maoists had anything to do with the massacre since it was ironic, at the time, they needed an event just like this one to happen to support their war. But the final ruling was made when the evidence became clear that there was a Family dispute before the massacre, where Dipendra’s parents would not let him wed the woman of his choice.
 * __Introduction __**

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Religion is one of the largest contributors to Nepal’s culture. Throughout history, art has preserved all types of cultural aspects of Nepal. There are many forms of Nepal’s art where this can be witnessed. Sculptures of religious figures and Shrines can be found almost anywhere throughout Nepal. Most of the oil paintings and canvas drawings that are preserved from over three thousand years ago depict religious figures such as Siddhārtha Gautama (more commonly known as Buddha), which is one of the most famous religious gods in the world’s history, and one of the most common statues that is on display throughout Nepal. Buddha is depicted as many beings and forms, a very common depiction of Buddha is him as a not necessarily a god but a normal person, many paintings show Buddha not being looked up to as a god but being among men as if he was a normal person. Another form of art that is very common in Nepal (even today) is a landscape oil painting depicting some kind of workers doing everyday things, like working in a field or carrying a boat. While I was in Nepal, I was explained why this was a common form of art, the reason I was told was “When a Nepalese is involved in his occupation, he does not complain, argue or fuss about the work. He simply smiles and enjoys the work that is given to him, no matter what it may be”. This can be witnessed when looking at a picture of this type of landscape art, the workers do not look upset or angry as if they just want to get the work done and get home, they look at peace and happy. This type of art not only shows Nepal’s true culture but the people involved in the history of the culture. This art shows the true form of the Nepalese culture and community, it preserves the way the people are and always have been and directly reflects on the way each new generation grows and is taught.
 * __Culture of Art __**

Born in 1899, Katmandu Nepal. Maskey first graduated artist of Nepal and then studied at Calcutta Government School of Arts (located in India). After being in India and finishing his degree, he began teaching at Tri-Chandra College, Padmakanya High School. After teaching, Maskey was recruited to a Nepal Museum where he worked as a Curator in the archeology department. He found that he procured an interest in archeology which led him to participate in an international art expedition (maskey 1). Maskey would carry his curiosity of archeology for the rest of his life, incorporating it in certain pictures and oil paintings but never returned to follow a career in archeology. Maskey’s is hard to describe in a few words or a sentence but the style of his art can be described as “Used water colour, charcoal, pastel etc. for the paintings as medium and subjected to portraits, landscapes, religious paintings and other gerne paintings” (maskey 1). Unfortunately (and oddly enough) I found his birth origin but I was unable to find any knowledge about his death besides the year. Throughout Nepal’s history there has been a lot of ancient art and artifacts that have been protected to preserve Nepal’s culture. Before the late 1800’s there was no cameras to capture a glimpse of history so people would draw on canvas, oil paint, sculpt to preserve what part of history they could. Many of the portraits that Maskey did were exactly for this reason. If you look at his work and the work of similar Nepali artists similar to Maskey, you will see that the landscape snapshots that he draws like in the center picture, he is simply trying to capture the moment at which these people are enjoying themselves as if he is writing a story in color. Many artists have this same sort of technique and goal when they are trying to draw picture such as this. During his time, Maskey was a very famous artist throughout areas of Nepal. Royal families would summon Maskey to paint portraits of them as if they were hiring someone to come take a group photo. Many of the other paintings you will see by Maskey are just portraits of important individuals such as an important king at the time. Another common work of Maskey’s is involving some sort of religious figure into a scene. Most of the portraits you see of this type by Maskey and other artists are telling a story that comes from their religion, through the painting they describe this certain story by putting certain gods in the picture or having them in a certain position. The picture to the left shows three gods Shiva, Parvati, and Ganesh (this is my best guess from the knowledge I have of the stories of Hinduism). Shiva and Parvati are the parents of Ganesh, who is the one bowing to them in the picture. Shiva is one of the most powerful and influential gods in Hinduism and so to me, it looks like he’s asking them for either forgiveness or for approval. I don’t know the actual story but just by looking at the painting I start creating a story about these gods and the unimaginable things they did and it’s a very powerful feeling.  From __Maskey: Priemere Artists of Nepal__, Book 3 (Maskey 3)
 * __Chandra Man Singh Maskey (1899 -1984) __**

The Nepal Fine Art Academy (NAFA) was founded in 1955 by King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev, at the time the king was crown prince. The king accepted the presidency/chair of NAFA and the organization began to grow. NAFA is always working towards bringing together artists working in the field of fine arts and others who have the same interests in or have contributed to the field. Their motto is “To work as the central coordinating body in the field of fine arts.” (nafa) They work as a whole, trying inspiring others around the world or anyone who is interested but their main focus is to inspire and encourage the development of art in Nepal. One of the mission’s on their website is “To establish a sound relationship with other national and international organizations working in related field of fine arts”. They like to preserve what they can in history by doing their own part to “carry out, study on, protect and ensure the betterment of Art and Architecture of Art and Craft of historical importance”. (nafa)The organization offers work to people interested in working in museums who like to offer help to preserve historical art and artifacts. They have 13 studios that they have set up for local artists all across Nepal to put their art on display for communities to see. The best thing NAFA does for local artists is a competition they hold called the National Arts and Craft Exhibition for artists to compete for a medal and the honor to win the exhibition.
 * __Nepal Fine Art Academy __**

Lincoln School was founded in 1954, is an independent day school for students of all nationalities in Preschool through Grade 12 that is operated by a nine-member Board of Directors (lincoln). Lincoln is one of the largest schools in Nepal and has many other aspects than just being a day school. The school reaches out to other schools in the country to provide outreach programs to help kids accelerate in different areas that they might not be getting at their school. They provide online classes for students not in the area. The most important program they provide is a pre-college program to help get them prepared for the certain field their focused on studying in. The school, being located in the Himalayas, invested a huge amount into their arts program. To provide a more cultural understanding, the school teaches the students about the historical nature of the area. Every morning the school does a prayer before they begin the day which is a lot different than what America is now allowed to do. They incorporate religion into a lot of their teachings, the Himalayas bring a lot of religious and cultural background and Lincoln would like to preserve this by providing as many programs to teach it. Lincoln provides many summer programs such as summer camps and classes, many of the programs welcome international students but focus on preserving as much of their culture as possible. Lincoln provides a lot of their programs because many schools across Nepal don’t have the resources to provide the same opportunities. Because of a lot of Nepal’s low income areas, the school also provides certain scholarship opportunities to students who can’t afford the cost of tuition but would like to join the school. I believe this is why this school provides these types of opportunities; through my research it was very hard to find programs that provided opportunities like this. The school I visited when I was traveling in Nepal could hardly provide schooling to the students they had and did not have many opportunities to take on more students. The interesting thing about the school is that instead of having a superintendent or a professor they have “masters”, which are highly taught professionals trained underneath a previous master and have been promoted to master themselves.
 * __Lincoln School __**

Students in a preschool classroom

Researching about the education in Nepal was very surprising; I have witnessed firsthand the educational experiences in a class room in Nepal when I visited Nepal and it was still compelling to learn how difference the schools operate. Students in Nepal do not get a lot of the opportunities that students get in countries like America. After trying to researching about art programs in America was very easy, after a quick search there were many to choose from but it was much different than Nepal. I had to find a program within a school that provides opportunities to other schools because it was very difficult to find a art program that was just provided to any school. The type of art that I researched was a lot different than the art we see in America. A lot of the art incorporates religion into many aspects of the projects that are worked on; many of the schools even say a prayer before the day begins which is a lot different than what is allowed in America nowadays. It was very surprising to learn about how much religion is involved in the art that is taught because I have never been in a school that has taught anything about religion. I really like a lot of the art that is in Nepal and the cultural or religious meaning behind it but something I had never thought about before was how much that was involved in the educational background of everyone. They are raised learning about religion, religion is involved in a lot of their society and community, it is incorporated in most of the art and it’s not being forced on them as something they have to learn, they enjoy learning it and want to because it is so weaved into their culture that it’s one of their society norms.
 * __Conclusion __**

__Sources__

(lincoln) [] (nafa)[] (maskey 1) [] (maskey 3) []