activity such as archery, say, can be a form of Chan art.
That is, if the absence or presence of Chan essence in
a painting depends upon the painter’s own achieve-
ment, it then follows that virtually any activity or prod-
uct, so to speak, will be similarly endowed. From there
it is only a small step to the countless books and web
sites that make Zen art forms (in some cases face-
tiously, to be sure) of everything from photography,
writing, and psychoanalysis, to smoking, ice resurfac-
ing, and procrastination.
Chan art as anti-art?
If Chan art from Waley onward has been characterized
as diverging from other forms of Buddhist art both in
terms of what it represents and how it represents it, it
has also been portrayed as functioning differently from
the norm. In comparison to traditional Buddhist art,
which emphasizes the replication of set iconographical
subjects and styles that conform to a canonical ideal, the
Chan emphasis on iconoclasm—both figurative and
literal—constitutes a kind of anti-Buddhist art. As one
scholar puts it, “In (Chan/) Zen Buddhism, cult images
in the traditional sense play as little a part as classic
Mahayana sutras. After all, (Chan/) Zen is looking for
‘independence from holy scriptures’ and ‘a special
transmission outside traditional doctrines.’” Thus,
while cult images and icons are worshiped by other
Buddhists, the Chan practitioner “ridicules the popu-
lar worship of relics” (Brinker 1996, pp. 38–39). Like
claims about the Chan school itself, in short, Chan
painting is presented here as unfettered by orthodox
tradition.
A serious challenge to the basic assumptions of such
interpretations has been offered by T. Griffith Foulk
and Robert H. Sharf (1993/1994) in a detailed study of
portraits of Chan abbots (a large and important sub-
set of Chan-associated images). As they show quite
convincingly, such portraits played an important role
in Chan funerary and memorial rituals, and they con-
clude that “the portrait of the abbot, like the living ab-
bot on his high seat, is thus properly viewed as a
religious icon—it is a manifestation of buddhahood
and a focus for ritual worship. As such, the portrait is
functionally equivalent to the mummified remains of
the abbot, to the relics of the Buddha, or to a stupa, in
that it denotes the Buddha’s presence in his very ab-
sence” (p. 210).
Their assertion—that Chan painting here func-
tions very much like orthodox Buddhist painting does
elsewhere—parallels several studies of Chan institu-
tional history, which similarly conclude that Chan
monasticism, contrary to popular perception, did not
radically differ from supposed mainstream practices.
That is, regardless of lineage or school affiliation, all
Buddhist monks in the Song period took part in sim-
ilar practices and rituals (e.g., studying and chanting
sutras, engaging in seated meditation) that were es-
sentially part of the very structure of the monastic in-
stitution as a whole, and thus did not vary much
between designated Chan monasteries and other es-
tablishments (Foulk, pp. 220–221).From the perspective of art history, the relative lack
of differentiation in terms of day-to-day activities and
procedures between Chan monks and non-Chan
monks suggests the likelihood of comparable continu-
ity with regard to the images employed in support of
those same activities. It suggests, that is, that Chan
painting and Buddhist art, far from constituting in-
verse categories, should instead be understood as
largely coextensive. If the popular conception of Chan
and Zen doctrine as irrational and free from orthodox
strictures is essentially a modern misreading (Sharf),
so, too, must the prevailing definitions of Chan art as
unfettered embodiments of the enlightened mind be
seen as the result of the same false premises. There is
little question that Chan visual culture served particu-
lar rhetorical and ideological claims, but we must also
recognize that Chan art served the same sorts of iconic,
ritual, and social functions as orthodox Buddhist art
traditions.See also:China, Buddhist Art in; Japan, Buddhist
Art in; Korea, Buddhist Art in; Zen, Popular Con-
ceptions ofBibliography
Brinker, Helmut. Zen in the Art of Painting,tr. George Camp-
bell. New York: Arkana, 1987.
Brinker, Helmut. Zen: Masters of Meditation in Images and Writ-
ings,tr. Andreas Leisinger. Zurich, Switzerland: Artibus
Asiae, 1996.
Fontein, Jan, and Hickman, Money. Zen Painting and Calligra-
phy: An Exhibition of Works of Art Lent by Temples, Private
Collectors, and Public and Private Museums in Japan, Orga-
nized in Collaboration with the Agency for Cultural Affairs of
the Japanese Government.Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1970.
Foulk, T. Griffith. “Sung Controversies Concerning the
‘Separate Transmission’ of Ch’an.” In Buddhism in the Sung,
ed. Peter N. Gregory and Daniel A. Getz, Jr. Honolulu: Uni-
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