Dong Qichang’s Zen Buddhism Calligraphy Research And Own Calligraphy Creation

The paper mainly studies the Zen Buddhism thoughts implied in Dong Qichang’s calligraphy renowned in the history of China. Against the cultural and religious background of the late Ming Dynasty, the paper reveals the original source of "introducing Zen Buddhism into calligraphy". Though belonging to the fields of religion and art respectively and are originally different in nature, Zen Buddhism and calligraphy are essentially quite similar in that the former advocates "Buddha nature" and "enlightenment" and the latter pursues the expression of one’s mind and temperament. This also explains why the art of calligraphy can be influenced by Zen. Actually, the thoughts of Zen also purify minds through the influence on calligraphy, carrying forward the natural dispositions of sincerity, goodness and beauty. The introduction of Zen Buddhism into calligraphy is the intrinsic spiritual pursuit of calligraphy. The idea of "thoroughly remolding oneself" in Dong’s calligraphy thoughts is just the Buddha nature pursued by Zen, which means the complete awakening of artists to get rid of afflictive hindrances in the mortal world and follow their hearts.The paper is aimed to expound the "simple but elegant, ethereal and pure" artistic features of Dong’s Zen Buddhism calligraphy style, by borrowing the ideas of "no distractions", "no appearance" and "conscience" in Zen Buddhism. The self-possessed and self-knowing thoughts of Zen Buddhism breaking "attachment to the ego" and "attachment to dharma" are introduced into the interpretation and study of Dong’s calligraphy, so as to acquire more in-depth artistic and spiritual experience. Furthermore, the author catches a glimpse of Dong’s wisdom and explanations of Zen Buddhism calligraphy in his Discourse on Calligraphy to hereby reflect on his own calligraphy creation. A concrete analysis is made on the application of Dong’s Zen Buddhism calligraphy thoughts in the author’s calligraphy works in order to shed some light on his calligraphy creation in the future.