The Fascination of Japanese Buddhist Art to a Global Audience

Art of the Orient, 2023

Since 1997, a multimedia installation titled Nirvana by Japanese artist Mariko Mori (b. 1967) has intrigued experts as well as art lovers. Dressed in a pink kimono of her own design, the artist embodies Buddha Amitabha wandering in the Pure Land. She is accompanied by six bodhistattvas associated more with images of aliens than the glowing beings known from traditional Buddhist iconography. The aesthetics of this work, moreover, are perfectly in line with the kawaii style, extremely popular in Japan since the 1990s, which dominated pop culture at the time. Analysing this work, it is therefore worth asking to what extent the inspiration of Buddhism in the art of the Japanese woman is superficial, and to what extent conscious. Can her work be seen as a continuation of her native cultural tradition, or rather as kitsch? Or perhaps a camp aesthetic? To answer these questions, in the article I will depict selected works by Mori, as well as other East Asian artists such as Kim Sooja (b. 1957, South Korea), Liu Ren (b. 1980, China) and Lu Yang (b. 1984, China), who also evoke Buddhist iconography in their works.

ANNALS OF “DIMITRIE CANTEMIR” CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY Vol. XIX, No. 1., 2018

Buddhist art constitutes an immense part of the history of Japanese art. Its themes dominated the visual arts for more than a millennium in Japan, and most of the oldest surviving art works were made for Buddhist purposes. Its prominence is undeniable and its aesthetic appreciation is beyond doubt, however, the shift of religiosity in the modern society, and the reconsideration of religious art is open for discussion. In the present study, I explore and give an overview of the different platforms for Buddhist art displays in Japan, and how these stages are operating in the new millennium. I am also inserting a brief outlook of how one of the esoteric deities, Fugen Enmei bodhisattva is presented in Japan and abroad.

Following the introduction of Buddhism to Japan in the sixth century, the faith quickly became a defining feature of Japanese civilization, in large part because of the diverse and abundant visual culture it engendered that both reflected and shaped its religious practice. Although Japanese Buddhism remains a vital living tradition, until the last twenty years, its visual culture created after the 16th century has received little attention by scholars. Since then, Japanese and Western language studies on focused aspects of Buddhist paintings, sculpture, and architecture, with most addressing the early modern period (ca. 1600–1868), have proliferated but until the publication of Patricia Graham’s Faith and Power in Japanese Buddhist Art, 1600–2005 (2007), no survey of materials spanning this long time period had been attempted. This brief essay does not summarize Graham’s broad analysis of the thread of change over time and the plurality of later Buddhist practice in Japan manifest in its abundant visual culture. Instead, drawing on the examples presented in Graham’s study, it introduces significant and representative sites of worship from the 17th century to the present to highlight the ways the faith became transformed in tandem with changes in Japanese society, manifested in the convergence of patronage, image production, and religious devotion at these sites. Discussion is presented chronologically in four parts beginning with an overview of studies on Japanese Buddhism’s recent visual culture. This is followed by three sections on the sites and related imagery: Buddhist sites of worship in the early modern period, Buddhist sites of worship in the modern period before World War II, and Buddhist sites of worship in the modern period after World War II.

Around 2011, Murakami Takashi, a world-renowned contemporary artist, started The 500 Arhats project for the Princess of Qatar. The exhibition Takashi Murakami: The 500 Arhats, held at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo from October 2015 to March 2016, was highly praised by Japanese media and art lovers. With his Zen calligraphy-like “Ensō series,” Murakami’s works seem to have gained appreciation as new Buddhist Art as well as for being influenced by Japanese pop culture. Murakami conceived the idea of The 500 Arhats through his interaction with the art historian Tsuji Nobuo in connection with the art journal Geijutsu Shinchō. While his notion of using Buddhist icons is filled with “play” rather than religious “pray,” many media reports after 3.11 downplayed the entertaining aspect of Murakami’s drawings, focusing instead on his spiritual development resulting from the disaster. As for his “Ensō series,” Murakami’s intention was to create Zen-like pictures representing the turbulent, war-torn Japanese medieval era as an indication toward the U.S., a nation that has repeatedly engaged in war since 1950; however, his intention was neither tranquility nor simplicity, Murakami’s “Zen” was embedded in the 3.11 discourse. Research-related work connected with the Japanese art journal Bijutsu Techō gave me an opportunity to interview Murakami in November 2016. Based on that experience, this paper will discuss the connections between the artist’s intention, oil money, the Western art market, and the post-3.11 national narratives of Japan.

Вестник Пермского университета. Философия. Психология. Социология, 2016

Spiritual tradition in Japan under the influence of philosophy of Buddhism, which mediated the insight about transience of all things and is oriented towards the acceptance of life in all forms, created important aesthetic concepts, which are defined by objective character (with a bunch of images, metaphors and styles); and according to subjective criterions they express the appearance of individual feelings, which are linked with mood, state of consciousness or atmosphere. Concepts of Japanese aesthetics reflect timeless and always current expression of nondualistic attitude towards the world, which is based on understanding all things in their essential nature. The art form and aesthetic sensibility point to an important soteriological tendency of the Buddhist philosophy-holistic view, which does not allow gaps between human and reality, is the foundation for the highest state of being, nirvāṇa, which is the source of special beauty and leads to liberation from worldly adversities.

Journal of Japanese Studies, 1993

Art in America, 2019

The Journal of Religion, 1994

2010

Unlike most Western aesthetics, which recognize (aesthetic) pleasure, independent of other values (truth and falsity, good and evil), as the primary value of aesthetic experience, the various Japanese aesthetics recognize a range of objectives and effects that is more complex. First, there is a wider range of types of aesthetic pleasure. Those best known and most influential in the West include aware/mononoaware (an awareness of the poignance of things, connected to a Buddhist sense of transience and to passing beauty); yūgen (deep or mysterious and powerful beauty, especially in Noh theater); wabi (powerlessness, loneliness, shabbiness, wretchedness); sabi (the beauty accompanying loneliness, solitude, quiet); and shibui (an ascetic quality or astringency, literally the sensation afforded by a pomegranate, which also imparts a rich but sober color to wood stains, etc.). Second, Japanese aesthetic experiences and activities are employed in the service of a wider range of objectives. These include (aesthetic) pleasure and the revelation of truth; self-cultivation that is not only artistic but also physical, social, emotional, psychological, and spiritual; the construction of personal, group, and national identity; and the formulation of relationships. This article begins with an overview of the uniqueness of Japanese aesthetics. It then examines several of the unique objectives of Japanese aesthetics in further detail. Japanese philosophy, Japanese aesthetics, aesthetic pleasure, aware, truth Japanese aesthetics have exerted broad, deep, and important influences on arts, on politics and power structures, and on individual lives not only in