A common style in East Asian Buddhist art emerged in China, Japan and Korea in the middle of the seventh century and prevailed for about a hundred years. What took shape from the exchange of ideas, practices, and art forms between China and the surrounding regions was a synthetic art style uniform in iconography and formal characteristics. In this richly illustrated study, Dorothy C. Wong argues that notions of Buddhist kingship and a theory of the Buddhist state were in the ascendant across East Asia during this period, and that these religio-political ideals found visual expression in the new art style. Wong asserts that Buddhist pilgrim-monks (traveling between the courts and religious centers) were among the key agents in the transmission of these ideals, and her work assesses their role in the spread, circulation, adoption and transformation of the visual language of state Buddhism, and of the attendant rituals and practices. Transcending cultural and geographical boundaries, this cosmopolitan visual style of Buddhism helped shape the cultural landscape of Northeast Asia.