Art And Architecture
Need For Preservation And Promotion

By Khilendra Basnyat

IN general, arts are the expressions of men to convey different meanings. However, some expressions might be superior and some inferior.

Nature

Arts try to tell us something about nature and about life. They may be in the form of apprehending character or in the form of sharing the interest and excitement of others. Also, they may be in the form of enjoying arts.

Since the early men had plenty of leisure, he whiled away long hours in making new things. In the beginning, he began to record his desires and deeds on rocks, bones and hides. His first work on the walls was strokes and scratches. Later on, his work developed to the stage of rhythmic scribbles of cones and circles.

In fact, art has been with man in diverse activities since his very existence. Although his first expression was crude, the forms were simple and understandable. The urge to create something of beauty was always present in him.

Every part of the world has played an important role in enriching the treasure house of art in different eras. One is the orient, which includes India, China, Japan and Persia. Another is the Asia Minor and Mediterranean, which include Egypt, Semitic, Byzantine, the Mohammedan, the Coptic and the Hellenistic. Then there is the Euro-American beginning with the spread of classical art in Europe and Colombian era.

No doubt, art is as valuable as the science, philosophy or ethics. It reflects the state of human society through the individuals. Art gives us a glimpse into the core and kernel of the collective mind and societies through the mirror of individual mind that created them. No art object is made for its own sake, for the beauty of its own or for the delight of its colour. There is always a purpose in it, may be social or religious or others.

Whatever may be, arts are the results of centuries of experiments of man. These lie scattered like a crystal bowl through a marble. One has to collect patiently these stray pieces to study and to know how arts developed in a particular era. The basic urges that inspire art also motivate crafts whether in painting or in carving or in shaping a pottery vase. The fundamental forces that compel one to create beauty are the same.

Fine arts such as painting and sculpture form an integral part of handicrafts such as toy making, metal and woodcarving and pottery. In such handicrafts, there is an unlimited scope for the free play of the creative imagination of every individual. Buddhist and Hindu culture especially inspire the arts of Nepal. The Kathmandu Valley with Lalitpur and Bhaktapur, second and third towns in importance, constitute a rare assemble of art and architecture.

Handicrafts (especially bronze and brass in Lalitpur, pottery in Thimi, wood carving and painting in Bhaktapur) prove that traditional genius of arts is still living in Nepal. Folklore, festivals, music and dances can be seen everywhere in this country throughout the year. Actually, preservation and promotion of traditional or folk performing arts have been a main concern in Nepal throughout its history.

From the beginning of the Christian era till today, the Nepalese people have been celebrating various kinds of traditional, religious and folk cultural heritages. The religious harmony and the tolerance between Buddhism, and Hinduism have been a strong force behind the continuity of cultural tradition and arts in this country. Both the Lichhavi and Malla rulers continued this age-old tradition of patronising and promoting the arts of Nepal.

After the unification of Nepal, King Prithivi Narayan Shah, the Great, made monumental efforts for the preservation and promotion of Nepalese arts. Other Shah Kings followed the suit. During the Rana regime, the rulers of Nepal neither encouraged nor discouraged the arts of this country. Consequently, our art could not flourish during this regime.

However, after the downfall of the Rana rule and the introduction of democracy in Nepal, some endeavours were made for the protection and promotion of the art of this country. In this regard, some institutions such as the Department of Archeology, Royal Nepal Academy, Nepal Association of Fine Arts, Nepal Art Council, National Archives, were established. Since the past few decades, some donor agencies have also shown their interest in the preservation and promotion of our art and architecture. For example, UNESCO came forward to assist us in preserving and promoting some of our unique art and architecture.

The Nepal-German Bhaktapur Project, begun in 1974, has played a significant role in the preservation and promotion of Bhaktapur's historical art and architecture. During the 1980s, the Pacific Asia Travel Association supported various historical preservation projects in order to counter the threats of neglect, air pollution, theft and new construction. These projects have helped protect and promote our art and architecture.

Likewise, the Government of Austria assisted us in securing the art and architecture of Lalitpur.
Nepal's architectural monuments are all concentrated within an area of less than two hundred and fifty square miles. They are all situated in the Kathmandu Valley. Of early civil architecture, we have no extant remains because these were all made presumably of perishable materials such as wood, reed, mud, thatch, burnt and unburned bricks.

Need

In reality, the overall picture or situation of the existing art and architectures in Nepal are far from satisfactory. There are still many arts and architectures in need of protection and promotion for which this country lacks resources and knowledge. For this purpose, the concerned authorities should take initiatives in this regard.

Tourism And Development Concepts

By Ananda Ghimire

HIMALAYAN region of Nepal covers immense natural beauty with a high level of cultural and biological diversity. It is the region with highest tourism potentialities but has deep-rooted poverty. Limited number of tribal people with limited movement and operating limited activities were managing eco-system of the region for thousands of years. Trade and commerce and pilgrimage were the main motivating factors of travel. The local people of the region were catering the needs of the travelers. Some of the most popular tribal people running hospitality business were Thakalies of Thak Khola and Sherpas of the Khumbu regions.

Drastic Change

Political changes of 1951, 1961 and 1990 brought a drastic change in the region. Involvement of the local / regional people in the central and national politics, and the wrong approach of the national politicians to the people as voter- bank changed the traditional system of local leadership, decision making, concept of village property, concept of village good-well, concept of responsibility. Central government took the assets but the incapable hands of the government stooped to reach the needy people. Central planners to satisfy the inexperienced politicians, to fulfill the unlimited wants and dreams shown by the political leaders, growing populations genuine need for food, shelter, health care and education, raped this virgin mountain environment. In the name of development the government, different agencies, NGO, INGO, political parties disturbed and destroyed the cultural, social, religious and natural ecosystem in the last two decades.

Further development of tourism brought with a lot of negative side effects - pressure on the environment, overuse of the landscape, unbalanced development, etc. Tourism industry forced our government, local authorities, and social system to jump from long deep-rooted traditional subsistence village economy into the global era of unlimited mobility. The excessive mobility of the outsiders affected nature and lead to server environmental damage. The laissez-fair development of tourism provided new opportunities of income to the people and to the government.

As we know that tourism is a service industry and tourism is the result of movement during leisure time for the sake of pleasure. So It has been timely realised in some tourism based countries that to operate long term tourism business there must be a wise use of its raw materials. Then only we may guarantee the longevity of the tourism. To operate tourism industry by protecting and preserving its raw material is known as eco-tourism.

Eco tourism has a major role to play in conserving the nature, culture, tradition and heritage. Eco-tourism is the answer of the questions: How can positive changes be instigated while avoiding the negative impacts? How can tourism be organised so that it achieves objectives such as poverty alleviation and environmental protection? .

It takes time to convince the travel organizers, tour operators and to the society how important our national assets are for national development. Because even in this present time, some people are engaged in clearing the forest and increase farmland and feed the increased family members. Travel organizers are not investing single penny to preserve environment. The development of tourism earned them easy money with zero investment. We often think wild animals are to be killed. We never realised the cost of natural resources. We treat natural resources as free resources. We are busy killing our golden egg laying chicken.

National development is based on the proper utilisation of its natural resources. The proper utilisation of the national asset as national environment is equally important to run tourism industry. So National development and preservation of environment and tourism are interrelated. The national asset is known as attraction in tourism, which attracts tourist to travel. In tourism industry attractions either man-made or the natural are processed by manpower and the service is produced. Its raw materials are attractions and energy it uses is manpower. It has been well understood that a factory will continue to operate as long as there is raw materials and undisturbed continuity of energy.
The attractions are the elements which attracts the people, it determines the choice, creates the desire to travel to the destination. It requires two times once to generate the travel. It makes him to leave the routine jobs and go to new places. The second time attraction requires to entertain or to provide him pleasure.

So it is high time to re-define tourism. Instead of the traditional concept of treating it as business, it must be considered as major force of development and modernisation. Tourism as a development agent requires careful planning in order to avoid possible negative effects. It has to focus on the ecological aspect of all activities. It should not be considered as a simple business. Central government or local authorities should not treat tourism as a source of income but rather as a subordinate income to the existing subsistence economy.

Every institute directly or indirectly involved in tours should established a partnership with local communities and natural elements and make them responsible actors to gain the objective of long term benefit.

Possibility

His Majesty's Government has identified tourism as a priority sector to alleviate poverty in rural areas. Tourism is a potential economic sector for rural development. The rural parts of Nepal with rich cultural and natural heritage have tremendous possibility for developing tourism. If the development of the tourism can be related with the involvement of local people and preservation of the eco-system, it would be the best means of village development.