Dr.
wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin
christiane.kalantari(at)oeaw.ac.at
+ 43 1 51581 - 6473
Christiane Kalantari is the director and postdoctoral researcher of the FWF project Buddhist Monuments of Khartse, Western Tibet. Her main areas of expertise include historical, visual, anthropological and theoretical investigations of Tibetan and Himalayan religious cultures and their artistic expressions.
She received her Dr. phil. in Art History from the University of Vienna, Institut für Kunstgeschichte, where she pursued graduate studies in Western Tibetan Buddhist art and culture (10th–13th centuries), with a strong emphasis on interdisciplinary collaboration and transcultural perspectives. Her research is dedicated to exploring themes that cross conventional methodological, geographic, and cultural boundaries, bringing together experts from various fields to analyze broader contextual frameworks. Her work is grounded in an extensive body of documentation gathered through multi-sited, interdisciplinary field research across historical Western Tibet, including Ngari, Himachal Pradesh, and Ladakh.
Key interests include cross-cultural dimensions of material culture and artistic interaction, processes of societal and religious-artistic transformation in pre-modern Western Tibet, the ritual and aesthetic spaces of Buddhist temples, materiality of religion, local cults of female territorial deities, and representations of donorship, femininity and female agency in both visual and textual traditions.
She acted as convener and coordinator of the international symposium & exhibition: A Transdisciplinary Approach to Mughal Studies (together with Simone Wille, Corinna Forberg and Christine Bruckbauer), Austrian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Iranian Studies in cooperation with Schloss Schönbrunn, 2024. Together with Tamana Niazi and Elisabeth Kapeller (WILPF Austria) she curated exhibitions such as Cultures of Pleasure. Practices, Prohibition and Subversion in Afghanistan (1957-2022); (philomena + art and architecture platform, Vienna, 2022). She is co-editor (with Christian Jahoda) of the volume entitled Early West Tibetan Buddhist Monuments: Architecture, Art, History and Texts. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume III). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 2021 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1553/978OEAW87776.
2021 (edited book) with Christian Jahoda(eds) Early West Tibetan Buddhist Monuments: Architecture, Art, History and Texts. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume III). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 441 pp.[pr], [oa] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1553/978OEAW87776.
2015 (authored book) with Tsering Gyalpo, Christian Jahoda and Patrick Sutherland; with contributions by Eva Allinger, Hubert Feiglstorfer and Kurt Tropper, ’Khor chags / Khorchag / Kuojia si wenshi daguan [Kuojia Monastery: An Overview of Its History and Culture]. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume I). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press (second, revised edition), 288 pp. https://verlag.oeaw.ac.at/produkt/khorchag/600901?product_form=3567.)
2012 (authored book) with Tsering Gyalpo, Christian Jahoda and Patrick Sutherland; with contributions by Eva Allinger, Hubert Feiglstorfer and Kurt Tropper, ’Khor chags/ Khorchag/ Kuojia si wenshi Daguan [Kuojia Monastery: An Overview of Its History and Culture]. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume I). 廓迦寺文史大观. [1.Edition], (in English, Tibetan and Chinese language), lHa sa: Bod ljongs bod yig dpe rnying dpe skrun khang. 288 pp.
Published articles and book chapters
2025 Material Mimesis and Craft Simulation: Textile Depictions and Transmediality in the Early Western Tibetan Buddhist Temple of Tabo, ca. 1000 CE. In: Calum Blaikie and Hubert Feiglstorfer (eds) Building and craft traditions in Tibetan and Himalayan architecture, Vienna, Austrian Academy of Sciences Press. 343-369 [pr], [oa] https://verlag.oeaw.ac.at/en/product/building-craft-traditions-in-tibetan-and-himalayan-architecture/99200977?name=building-craft-traditions-in-tibetan-and-himalayan-architecture&product_form=5696
2025 with Simone Wille, Corinna Forberg, Christine Bruckbauer. A Transdisciplinary Approach to Mughal Studies; International Symposium 03.2024, Austrian Academy of Sciences, Online Proceedings, https://www.oeaw.ac.at/en/ifi/ifidigital/webressourcen/digital-proceedings/a-transdisciplinary-approach-to-mughal-studies
2022 Feminine, Divine, Wise: Māyādevī, the Buddha’s Wondrous Mother in Early Western Tibetan Temples’ Narrative Cycles. In: Ines Konczak, Satomi Hiyama and Astrid Klein (eds) Connecting the Art, Literature, and Religion of South and Central Asia Studies in Honour of Monika Zin. New Delhi: DEV Publishers & Distributors, 171-188. Part of ISBN: 9789387496736.
2021 with Christian Jahoda. Power and Religion in Pre-Modern Western Tibet: The Monumental Avalokiteśvara Stela in lCog ro, Purang. In: Jahoda, Christian and Christiane Kalantari (eds) Early West Tibetan Buddhist Monuments: Architecture, Art, History and Texts. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume III). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 25-60. [pr], [oa] doi:10.1553/978OEAW87776; https://austriaca.at/8777-6inhalt?frames=yes .
2021 Hārītī and Pāñcika at Tabo: On the Metamorphosis of the Protective Couple in Early West Tibetan Buddhist Temples. In: Jahoda, Christian and Christiane Kalantari (eds) Early West Tibetan Buddhist Monuments: Architecture, Art, History and Texts. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume III). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 301-326. [pr], [oa] https://austriaca.at/8777-6inhalt?frames=yes
2021 with Tsering Gyalpo. Guge Kingdom-Period Murals in the Zhag Grotto in mNga’ ris, Western Tibet. In: Jahoda, Christian and Christiane Kalantari (eds) Early West Tibetan Buddhist Monuments: Architecture, Art, History and Texts. (Studies and Materials on Historical Western Tibet, Volume III). Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press, 407-430. [pr], [oa] https://austriaca.at/8777-6inhalt?frames=yes .
2020 with Eva Allinger. The spiritual quest of the Buddha in the Dungkar cave temple – Indian sources and Western Tibetan image-making. Part 1: From Tuṣita heaven up to the enlightenment. Études Mongoles & Sibériennes, Centrasiatiques & Tibétaines (EMSCAT), (issue edited by Quentin Devers) Vol. 51: 189-234. [pr], [oa] https://journals.openedition.org/emscat/4308
