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In this talk, Conan Cheong investigates the desire of eminent Lao Buddhist monks to photograph and be photographed by examining the monk portraits kept in the Buddhist Archive of Luang Prabang, Laos. The Archive, housed in a Buddhist monastery, preserves over 35,000 photographs taken and collected by monks from 1890. It was founded in 2005 by Sathu Nyai Khamchan Virachitta Maha Thela, head of the Sangha in Luang Prabang (1953-2007), and a German photographer, Hans Georg Berger.

Conan addresses monks’ photographic practices in relation to other objects collected in Buddhist temple contexts which may be described as “sacred” (Lao: sing saksit) — bone relics, Buddha images, ritual offerings, and particularly the life-sized monk portrait statues modeled naturalistically in wax, resin, or bronze.

Monks are indispensable in Buddhist ritual as the “highest field of merit (anuttaraṁ puññakkhettaṁ)”, where ritual giving (dāna) to them produces the highest level of soteriological benefit for the devotee. Drawing from his doctoral field research in Laos, Conan opens up a discussion on how the photographs of Luang Prabang monks might be seen as expressions of this meritorious giving, corresponding with Buddhological research into how the Buddha, as the quintessential monastic, is made a living presence in material things.

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