The Art Circle Library Thread.

[RichardH]

The Treeleaf Art Circle Library is a Zen Buddhist Arts and Culture resource for our community.

Members are invited to post the following….

Visual (photos and video), audio, digital, and interactive links, documenting art, craft, story, and music, directly related to the cultural transmission and practice of the Buddha Dharma. This can include both historical and contemporary work, including your own creations that have been publicly displayed*.

Each posting should begin with the tags #traditional, or #contemporary, or #treeleaf artist. The title should be clear and descriptive. The names of craftspeople involved and the time-frame of activity should also be included. Many great works of Buddhist Art have been created by anonymous craftspeople within a loose time frame. When this is the case you can reference the historical period of production. Any background information you can provide, including links, will be helpful.

Please direct any questions to me by PM, and thank you very much for participating.

Gassho
Daizan
Sat today

* Please do not be shy about including your own work on a thread containing historical work. If you have created Buddhist inspired art, grounded in your practice, and publicly displayed, you are doing what people have done for thousands of years.

[RichardH]

#traditional

Realm of the Hungry Ghost.

Hungry_Ghosts_Scroll_Kyoto_2.jpg

An Image from a Japanese scroll which describes the realm of the hungry ghosts and how to placate them. Currently housed at the Kyoto National Museum, artist unknown.

Gassho
Daizan
sat today

[Shokai]

Dogen's Fukanzazengi

Fukan.jpg
Zen Literature Website
Wikipedia Excerpt

Dogen zenji's Fukanzazengi, a text written when he was 26 years old, after he had just returned from studying at Ch'an temples in China. This text contains pointers for the practice of Zazen in the monastery Dogen established with Imperial support. But it also contains the essence of Dogen's theory of what "enlightenment" is and how it relates to everyday activity, such as taking up the sitting posture in the Dharma Hall.

gassho, Shokai

[Jundo]

#contemporary

I like these two artists from Japan ... the first is a bit of an acquired taste perhaps ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Takashi_Murakami

Takashi Murakami’s first solo exhibition in Japan in 14 years, set to open to the public at the Mori Art Museum at the end of October.

The centerpiece of this exhibition is “The 500 Arhats,” a hundred-meter-long painting inspired by a series of dialogues that Murakami conducted with art historian Tsuji Nobuo that is being shown in Japan for the first time. Consisting of four separate sections, each named for one of the Chinese guardians of the four celestial directions (blue dragon – east, white tiger – west, red bird – south, black tortoise – north).

Murakami’s epic painting was created in part as a gesture of thanks to Qatar, one of the first nations to offer Japan assistance in the wake of the earthquake and tsunami of March 2011. It was unveiled to great acclaim at the “Murakami – Ego” exhibition, held at the Al-Riwaq Exhibition Hall in Doha in 2012.

Originally, the 500 arhats were believed to be the enlightened disciples of Buddha who worked to spread his teachings. Their faith was transmitted to Japan during the Heian period and continued to penetrate the farthest reaches of the country in the form of relic-like paintings and sculptures.

“The 500 Arhats” also owes a deep artistic debt to Murakami’s historical predecessors from the Edo period, some of whose works will also be displayed as a counterpoint at this exhibition. Nagasawa Rosetsu’s rendition of the same topic, painstakingly and minutely depicted on a microscopic 3-centimeter-square area, seems to capture the cosmos in miniature. Kano Kazunobu’s sprawling “Five Hundred Arhats” series, on the other hand, consists of 100 painted scrolls created over a ten-year period that portrays the arduous training undergone by the arhats.

I also like this mid-20th Century woodblock artist ... Shikō Munakata (棟方 志功 Munakata Shikō?, September 5, 1903 – September 13, 1975) ... also Arhats ...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shik%C5%8D_Munakata

More here:

https://www.google.co.jp/search?q=Munakata+Shiko+buddhist&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwi6irHrz4DMAhWBn5QKHWJaDmcQ_AUIBygB&biw=1745&bih=868

Gassho, J

PS - Even in traditional Asian images, the 500 Arhats are often shown with their own very unique, human and often funny personalities. Here is an example ...

http://www.gokunming.com/en/blog/image/small/9539.jpg

[Mp]

#traditional

Ensō

In Zen Buddhism, an ensō (円相 , "circle"?) is a circle that is hand-drawn in one or two uninhibited brushstrokes to express a moment when the mind is free to let the body create.

More can be read here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ens%C5%8D

Enso.jpg

Gassho
Shingen

s@today

[Byrne]

A Bhavacakra I made last year #treeleafartist #contemporarybuddhistart
bhavacakra3.jpg

My favorite Buddha I've ever come across. This one is from China circa 1300's depicting Shakyamuni as an acetic. This one is one display at the Birmingham Museum of Art in Alabama which has an amazing Asian art section. Really unique stuff there. #traditionalbuddhistart
2015-10-20 14.07.42.jpg

Gassho

Sat Today

[Tai Shi]

#treeleaf artist

Meditations on Gratitude and Winter from Spring by Charles Taylor.

Special collections, Grinnell College Library.

Meditation on Space

Night sky shows clear,
Sixty miles gale forced wind
Vacuous points toward

Space above air, insight
Ash, maple, river birch,
Gone, cut from hot sand, earth,

This drought as dry February,
Clouds capture dusk, then night,
Filled with dark matter,

No oxygen, I turn to stars,
Escape gravity, earth below
Stratosphere ionic layer

Dissolves last of atmosphere,
More than seventeen thousand
Miles an hour into orbit,

Floats into vision, gone again,
Into light hours past
Jupiter, past my solar vision,
Thousands of unexpected forms,
Sun propelled at speeds
I cannot comprehend,
Atoms once in cubic space

Empty, insidious, natural
Black space rests again.

Tai Shi
Charles E Taylor
Gassho

[RichardH]

#traditional

"The Paradise of Maitreya"

A "dry fresco" by Zhu Haogu and Zhang Boyuan created in 1298. Located in the Bishop White Gallery of Chinese Temple Art , Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto.

ROM2011_11995_2.jpg

Gassho
Daizan

sat today

[Jinyo]

# treeleaf artist

Hi there - probably best if I just enter my website link - the most specific piece influenced by Buddhism is an installation I exhibited with a fellow artist - entitled
Skypath.

https://www.paulaburns.co.uk

The second novel (on the novels page) entitled 'Conversations with Leopard' definitely mirrors Zen philosophy regarding the challenges of life - the final chapters
deal specifically with my 'journey' thus far - beginning with a chance encounter with the teachings of Thich Nhat Hahn. There are also some reflections on my journey towards becoming an artist.

The earlier novel 'Blue Grey Island' also takes art as a theme and is quite Zen in its import (though the central character goes through a journey of losing and regaining his Catholic faith).

Just now - I'm thinking deeply on the convention of the Book of Hours - and wondering about working on a Buddhist equivalent. Does anyone have any ideas ?

I'd like to include art/poetry and music.

Gassho

Willow/Jinyo

sat today

[Cooperix]

#treeleaf artist

http://annecooperstudio.com/rakusu%20project.html

FEEL OF THE NEEDLE: THE RAKUSU PROJECT
I began working on this project several years ago and have had 2 performance/ installations (one in Albuquerque and one in Austin) with plans for more. I am a contemporary artist working in multi-media. This was my first choreographed performance. And it was a wonderful experience putting it together. And working with my amazing cast.

There is a link on the URL posted (page from my website) to see the 20 minute performance done in my studio a year and a half ago. IN all I have sewn 60 of the paper garments and have plans to continue sewing. Although I only use 21 in the performance/installations.

I learned to sew the paper facsimile rakusu from Taigu and learned about Santoka Taneda from Taigu as well. Bowing to Taigu and Treeleaf!!! such inspiration...

deep bow.
Anne
~st~

[Shokai]

The Birth of Buddha

Buddhist Treasures

baby buddha.jpg

The birth of the Buddha, Mural by Soliyas Mendis, Kelaniya Vihara, early 20th century. Soliyas Mendis' paintings are remarkable in showing their roots in the art of Sri Lanka and ancient India while serving the contemporaneous needs of Buddhists on the Island.

gassho,

[Shokai]

The Buddhist art of the Mogao Caves

Secrets of the Silk Road

buddha cave art.jpg
In a secret cave on China's ancient Silk Road, one of the world's most incredible collections of art lay locked away in darkness for 900 years.


gassho,

[Cooperix]

#contemporary

Here in New Mexico we must have an artist for every 5 people. A visually rich state, both with talent and beauty.
I will post several fellow artist's work over the next couple of days. Once I get the OK from them.

Today's post is the website of Susan Myo on Linnell. Sue's work is highly reflective of her dharma influence. She is currently in Okayama at Sogenji studying with Shodo Harada Roshi.

Her art career and Buddhist history is clearly stated on her "history" page, and you will find interesting work (ENSO paintings/ oxherding paintings) on the "artifacts" page. Sue is a wonderful painter and with her immersion in Zen the focus has turned more to the minimal and spare. When I first met her she was considered an abstract expressionist (early 80s).

IN my opinion she's one of the top painters in New Mexico.

http://www.susanmyoonlinnell.org/

Enjoy!
bows...

Anne

~st~

[Sozan]

#contemporary #traditional

Tenshin-en contemplative garden at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Watch the two videos at bottom of the page for a better look.

http://www.mfa.org/collections/featured-galleries/japanese-garden-tenshin-en

Gassho
Sozan

s@2day

[Cooperix]

#contemporary
_/\_

Patrick Nagatani is an emeritus professor retired from the University of New Mexico. He was in the photography department although its hard to classify him as only a photographer.
The Buddhist inspired work is shown on his website under BODIES OF WORK - tape-estries. Be sure to read the "statement" under the tape-estries heading. He describes his process in making these works and his inspiration. Essentially and with amazing results he "paints" with masking tape. You will need to scroll down to the "Buddhist Tape-estries" to see the dharma inspired work. Fortunate for me we own "Introspection".
He is an amazing artist. much admired both regionally and nationally.

http://www.patricknagatani.com/

respectfully submitted,
Anne

~st~