Upper and Lower Huayansi in Datong (northern
Shanxi), as well as numerous brick pagodas through-
out the area, express the activity of the Liao. Ensem-
bles tended to center on Guanyin and on esoteric
imagery of the Five Tathagathas. The tallest and old-
est wooden pagoda survives in Yingxianin Shanxi; built
during the mid-eleventh century, it is a marvel of tim-
ber construction, with each story containing a central
altar with large stucco statues. Dozens of magnificent
remains of statues of Guanyin, mostly in polychrome
and gilded wood and portraying the bodhisattva as
seated in a rocky grotto in a pose of royal ease, testify
to the continuing and dominant focus on Guanyin.
The Luohans also rose to great prominence in this pe-
riod, an early set being the famous ceramic statues
from Yizhou in Hebei, datable to the early eleventh
century. These sculptures all exemplify the naturalis-
tic trends of the Song period, expressed in the realism
of the face and hands and the heavy, naturally folded
drapery, without recourse to abstract patterns. The
Song image represents a truly humanistic interpreta-
tion of the most popular Buddhist images, those in-
dicative of compassion (Guanyin) and exemplary
teachers (Luohans), in large part spurred by the active
Chan and Huayan thought of this time.These trends continued into the Southern Song pe-
riod. Cycles of Luohans, many portrayed in paintings
following the Li Gonglin model, using rich color and
a landscape setting, as well as refined depictions of
Amitabha and his bodhisattvas, are masterful works by
academic painters or by the ateliers of professional
Buddhist painters in the South, especially centered in
Ningpo. The Dali kingdom in Yunnan saw a flourish-
ing Buddhist culture at this time that also produced
exquisite art. However, the most innovative Buddhist
art comes from the contributions of Chan painters, es-
pecially the paintings of Liangkai and Muqi during the
first half of the thirteenth century. Both of these mas-
ters had the ability to not only offer a fresh interpre-
tation of Chan themes, many of which were new to the
Buddhist art repertoire, but also to express these
themes in such a way that the very manner of execu-
tion becomes a Buddhist statement. The depth of un-
derstanding raised Buddhist art to its highest level,
where the way in which the subject is painted is as
much an expression of Buddhist thought as is the Chan
content of the painting. The work of Liangkai and
Muqi established a Chan painting tradition that was
carried on by others into the late thirteenth and four-
teenth centuries, though never with such resounding
success as by these two masters.Yuan (1234–1368), Ming (1368–1644), and
Qing (1644–1911) dynasties
Buddhist art in the Yuan dynasty followed several
streams. Besides Chan painting, which includes Chan
legendary characters, portraits of Chan masters,
Guanyin, nature themes, calligraphy, and so on, there
was the academic style of colorful paintings, especially
on the subject of Luohans, of which there are many
wonderful sets. In sculpture, powerful, heavy images
of Guanyin seated on craggy rocks—a theme popular
from the eleventh century and probably representingCHINA, BUDDHISTART IN
The bodhisattva Avalokites ́vara. (Chinese hanging scroll painting,
Song or Yuan dynasty, thirteenth–fourteenth century.) The Nelson-
Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri. Reproduced by per-
mission.