1. The unjustifiable central position of

1. The unjustifiable central position of the Buddhist statues

In the museum, Buddhas are all placed in the center of the entrance without implications about the timeline or their significance in the history of Champa culture.

In fact, the discussion of which religion appeared first in the history of Vietnam remains debatable. While the earliest Buddhist inscriptions and images in South-East Asia were found in the 5th century, it is also evident that Buddhism had been spread to Champa since the first century. Second, Buddhism no longer has an influence on the current cultural society of Champa even though it was most developed in the IX century.

This position of Buddha, in our opinion, leaves a strong impression on the visitors when first entering the room, elevating its significance in the museum’s Champa artifact collection. This strong impression, as we argue, should rather be put on the Hinduism god artifacts, not the Buddha collection since the main religion of the Cham people was Hinduism. Off the top of our head when visiting the museum, we believe that this central position of Buddha collection implies a bias over Buddhism in Champa culture of the Kinh. The Kinh is whom who curate this exhibition and they are influenced mostly by Buddhism. However, with further investigation, one thing we noticed is that this museum and the Da Nang museum of Cham scuplture were both re-curated by the same French team within the framework of Fonds de Solidarité Prioritaire-de Revalorisation du Patrimoine Muséographique Vietnamien (FSP) project. This fact has proved that our hypothesis is wrong. Another explanation for this way of curating is that this collection is the largest Dong Duong Buddha bronzes collection in Vietnam.

In addition, we argue that instead of paying full attention to the solemn collection of an important religion of Champa culture, visitors’ takeaways are distorted and distracted by the household ceramics and stonewares, which tell a whole different story of the daily activities and aesthetic pottery techniques of the ancient Champa people. This way of curating will reduce the solemnity and attention toward the Buddha simultaneously.

But, we also take into consideration the scarcity of Champa Buddhist images and the missing elements in the display of Buddhist art and archaeology of Dong Duong, which make it even harder for the museum curators to design this Buddha collection with any specific storytelling.