What to make of this book? This is a question posed several times by Stanley Abe throughout his innovatively formatted recent work, Imagining Sculpture: A Short Conjectural History. On the surface, Abe’s book is the culmination of the author’s inquiry into the birth of “sculpture” as an aesthetic category in China during the modern era. Here, and in research preceding this publication, Abe has offered a rich historical and historiographical account of the cross-cultural encounters that led to the birth of modern artistic and art historical inquiry into the category of sculpture—specifically Buddhist sculpture—in East Asia. Perhaps more importantly, despite the absence of clear aesthetic categories defining Buddhist sculpture in China before imperialist interventions in East Asia, Abe highlights a nexus of artists, objects, and antiquarians that offers insight into the lived histories of sculpture prior to the modern period.

While these questions are ostensibly the framework of Abe’s book, the author’s choice of format is the truly unusual and noteworthy contribution made by this volume. The work is laid out as a creation that approximates a travelogue or photomontage, divided across four sections (books) and an epilogue. Each book is subdivided into named chapters headed by a brief epigraph ranging from a short supposition to a simple date that frames the subject of the chapter that follows. They progress roughly chronologically through time, moving between geographical locations in East Asia, Europe, and the United States. The chapters are a pastiche of images—sculpture, paintings, portraits, prints, photographs, ephemera, and archival documents—accompanied by passages of guiding text that utilize a minimalist approach, placed unobtrusively above the images.

The text itself is narrative in format, providing a loosely structured account of historical circumstances, individuals, and objects enriched through the range of accompanying images. The text incorporates typical sources such as primary document quotations but also bridges the territory of historical fiction. On occasion, such as in chapter nineteen, “Antiquities Shop,” Abe invents a character (in this instance, 蔡嵐 Cai Lan, the daughter of an antiquities shop owner) to engage with or enliven a historical moment. In other cases, Abe imagines the circumstances, thought processes, and dialogues of historical figures he is describing, sometimes through engagement with present-day sources. This range of approaches is particularly evident in chapter fifteen, “Effigy,” which is centered on the life of Afong Moy, “The Chinese Lady,” who was marketed as a curiosity to global audiences in the nineteenth century. Afong was reimagined in a 2018 theatrical production that Abe also engages with as he portrays the circumstances of her life.

What emerges throughout the book is a network of individuals and materials, real and sensitively imagined, that provide insight into the broad notion of Chinese sculpture in the modern era. Because this narrative engages with many of the iniquities that China faced during the early modern era—particularly the major events of the so-called “century of humiliation”—it raises important questions far beyond that of the defining of sculpture. It must be acknowledged, however, that the book and its format are not without challenges. To avoid interrupting the narrative flow of the chapters, little contextual information is provided about materials and images until one reaches the end of chapter notes. It is crucial to read these notes, as they provide additional background and reveal the moments where Abe’s work makes forays into the imagined. If one does not read carefully, some of the characters and circumstances might be mistaken for actual individuals and encounters.

This point is important when considering the audience for this book. Abe writes in the introduction that he found it difficult to find a suitable publisher because of the unusual nature of the book, its many images, and unclear audience (vi). Myself a specialist in the historiography of Buddhist sculpture and ink rubbings, I can envision this volume as an excellent companion to my undergraduate seminars on the art historiography of East Asia. Because it is not an argument-driven piece of traditional scholarship, a general reader benefits from having further background knowledge about many of the people, events, and objects touched upon within the book. It is because of this, I find the book to be well-suited for teaching about the complexities of the early modern and modern eras in East Asia, and as a vehicle for exploring modes of historiographical inquiry. It encourages students of this period to inquire further into the materials it introduces and how they are portrayed.

Higher education has been confronted with a seemingly ever-increasing number of crises that need not be reiterated here. However, among the important ongoing issues facing scholars of humanistic disciplines is a fundamental rethinking of audiences and modes of communicating research. Alongside methodological developments in conducting and conveying research, we have also been tasked with rethinking frameworks for the evaluation of scholarly contributions. Abe has attempted something unusual, creative, and original in Imagining Sculpture.  He has presented a “. . . mosaic of people, scenes, and voices from a past time that could not know its future” acknowledging that it is “. . . an untidy story and a troublesome history. It too strives to be appropriate for its purpose” (397). While the range of audiences for this work may not yet be fully realized, Abe has done something noble in attempting to broaden the discourse and modes of storytelling surrounding an important topic. The results are multiple narratives woven together to present more inclusive viewpoints that are more appealing in structure to a broader audience, despite dealing with sometimes challenging material. While not perfect, it is my opinion that we should celebrate these efforts rather than strike them down in the name of tradition.

I will add a final note here concerning my own biases in reflecting on this book. I must admit I was inclined to like it from the outset. When writing art historiography, I often think about the range of possible interest in the narratives and arguments I build from source materials—be it art, documents, or otherwise. I have striven to make my work legible and readable beyond a traditional academic audience, even as I hope that it remains deep and engaging for that audience as well. This is a hard balance to cut, and I had the sense of a kindred spirit working through these very same issues while reading Imagining Sculpture. It is not a failing of this book or its stated purpose but, knowing the importance of Abe’s topic and being familiar with his prior research, I do still yearn for an additional book-length treatment of his arguments on the subject. That being said, I am happy he has given us Imagining Sculpture: A Short Conjectural History. Let us take up the charge of Stanley Abe and imagine other possibilities for our research.