Celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Culture (SISJAC), the Nara to Norwich online exhibition is now complete. The 142 exhibits illustrate the introduction of new religions at the ends of the Silk Roads—Buddhism in Korea and Japan, and Christianity in Britain and Scandanavia—and the subsequent changes in the life, landscape and material culture of these places.

Originally intended to be held in the Sainsbury Centre in Norwich, COVID disrupted our schedule and forced us to rethink. We decided to go online instead, by then knowing of the exhibitions planned at the British Museum and British Library. We met with colleagues from both institutions to discuss our respective ideas and kept in touch throughout the process. Going online allowed us more flexibility to include objects which would have been impossible to loan and to make landscapes central to the story. But the exhibitions at the BM and BL also meant that some of the objects in Nara to Norwich were being showcased in their exhibitions as well, such as the Helgo Buddha and the Dunhuang star chart.

Thanks to a collaboration with Hase Temple (総本山長谷寺) in Japan, in May 2024 we loaned a 12m tall digital replica of their Miei Daigajiku watercolour of Kannon—the bodhisattva Avalokitesvara—to hang in the Forum in Norwich during the week of the Norfolk and Norwich Festival. The original watercolour, 16.5m long and 6.2m wide,  was made after a statue of the bodhisattva Kannon (Avalokiteśvara) in the temple was destroyed by fire in 1495. The original scroll was intended as a model for the reconstruction of the statue, almost in actual size. It was completed during the Edo period (1603–1867). The digital scroll was installed in late evening when the Form was closed to the public: see the video.

It has been an immense pleasure to work with colleagues in Norwich and worldwide on this project over the past five years. We are now discussing a programme of research, events and publications for the coming 2-3 years.