Research On Zen Monk Paintings Of Bashu In Southern Song Dynasty

The monk painting is one of the important categories of Zen painting,mainly refers to the Zen people painting.The monk painting includes Zen monks' paintings and the ones they commented as well.The Southern Song Dynasty was the period where Zen painting become prosperous and mature,it also a period where the Zen painting artists began to have self consciousness for the aesthetics of their own.During this period,the Bashu Zen monk painting has independent research value.Under the influence of Buddhist ideas,Bashu Zen painting ideas in Southern Song Dynasty fit the overall development of Buddhist ideas very well.It was fully reflected to the Zen painting.According to the statistics,the Southern Song Dynasty Bashu Zen monk were mostly following Lin Jizong,both their painting style and item choose reflected his Buddhist ideas.In addition,Southern Song Dynasty Bashu Zen monk's painting connected closely to academic painting and portraits on style and item choosing.They have relative similarity and essential differences.A comparative analysis of the three makes the artistic value of the Buddhist scriptures in the Southern Song Dynastyclearer.At the same time,to explore the relevance of Zen painting,academic painting and portraits painting,in the essence of ideology,is actually a discussion of the relationship between Zen and new Confucianism,is also a study on the relationship between Buddhist culture and Confucianism.It put a new theoretical significance into the study of Southern Zen painting at the level of the art history from the sociology of religion and religious art theory perspective.As for the related research of monk paintings,the academic circles at home and abroad are mainly focused on: the study of the context of Zen painting history;or the research on the certain dynasty;the individual case study of Zen painting;the study of Zen painting under the cultural exchange between China and Japan.The existing gaps in the current study are as follows: First,there is a lack of historical staging and regional studies on monk paintings;Second,the theoretical level study of Zen paintings is not sufficient.The related research on Zen paintings in art discipline is often concentrated on art history,and lacks the theoretical level of inquiry.Third,the study of Zen paintings is only based on the Zen cultural background.In the process of studying Zen paintings,Chinese and Japanese scholars often revolved around the Song and Yuan dynasties,but they were often limited to the discussion within the religious sphere,but they ignored the relationship between Zen and Neo-Confucianism and Philosophy of the Mind,or the relationship between Buddhist culture and Confucianism.This paper mainly focuses on the research methods of philology,image study,religious sociology and Art religion,and discusses the Bashu Zen monk painting of Southern Song Dynasty in four parts.The introduction briefly explains the significance of the topic,research status at home and abroad,innovation and deficiencies of the thesis.The first chapter defines the concept of Zen monk painting and Bashu Zen monk,and then expounds the historical and humanistic background of Bashu Zen monk painting in Southern Song Dynasty.On the one hand,the development of politics,economy and culture in the Southern Song Dynasty contributed to the overall prosperity of its painting art,and the Bashu Zen monks in this period made many breakthroughs better than the previous ones.The development of Bashu Neo-Confucianism in this period constitutes the ideological background of the interactive infiltration of Zen monk painting,literati painting and Court painting.On the other hand,under the great prosperity of Bashu Zen and the Buddhism art,the Zen monk painting and the Buddhist stone carving statue are used to draw lessons from each other.The second chapter explores the relationship between Bashu Zen and Zen Buddhism in the Southern Song Dynasty from two major levels.First,the author tries to explore the influence of Song Dynasty Zen thought on Bashu Zen monks' painting idea through the painting works they commented;the second is to analyze the deep connection between the Linji Zen thought and the "secularization" of the paintings' form.The rise of literal Zen provides an opportunity for the development of Zen painting thought.The Southern Song Bashu Zen monks' idea on Essence,creation and reviews reflected all in their paintings and comments.In addition,according to the document statistics,the Southern Song Bashu Zen monks were mostly following Linji Zen.Whether it is the selection of the subject matter,the transmission of the theme,or the performance of the image features,the Zen masters tend to incorporate the theory of Linji Zen into the content and form of the painting.Under such painting semantics,the image of Buddha often exists as the life form of an ordinary people,and the way of practice permeates the present ordinary life.The third chapter,based on the classification standard of Zen monk painting,while combining the analysis of the theme and style of Zen monk painting,the author focuses more on the typical themes and techniques of the Bashu Zen monk painting in Southern Song Dynasty.The whole style of the Bashu Zen monk painting in Southern Song Dynasty is as follows: The painting idea is greatly influenced by the Linji Zen thought,which is obvious in the choice of subject matter and the expression of pen and ink technique.In particular,the mature use of reduced brushwork,splash-ink method and dimly discernible artistic conception in painting forms has created its unique style.Subject matters of Bashu Zen monk painting in Southern Song Dynasty have a lot of cross between themes;the painting style has a relatively consistent characteristic,and it depends on the selection of brushwork techniques.The fourth chapter is based on the thought background of "Incorporating Zen into Confucianism" in Southern Song Dynasty,the author clarifies the deep connection between the Bashu Zen monk painting,the Court painting and literati painting during this period.On the one hand,due to the relationship between Zen and kingly politics in the Southern Song Dynasty was based on mutual need and mutual utilization,Bashu Zen monks and the court had close interaction,and were deeply valued by the court.Therefore,in the field of painting,it has facilitated the interactive infiltration of Zen monks' and courts'.With the maturity of the Buddha image in southern Song Dynasty,the court painting works on Zen theme made it a great reference in their subject matter,composition and brushwork.Generally speaking,there is a kind of convergence on the aesthetic interest of the court painting and Zen painting,while the court painting focuses more on the expression of the subject matter,the Zen painting tends to surpass the subject matter itself.On the other hand,the relationship between Zen Buddhism,Neo-Confucianism and philosophy of the mind in Southern Song Dynasty created objective conditions for the interactive infiltration of Zen monk painting and literati painting.Both Zhu Xi's Neo-Confucianism theory and Lu Jiuyuan's philosophy of the mind theory have a strong Zen color in many ways.Under the background of "Incorporating Zen into Confucianism",the Bashu Zen monk painting and literati painting in Southern Song Dynasty have many references in their painting creation,specially on their subject matter,pen and ink.Admittedly,there are some differences in painting style and evaluation standard.Because of the fundamental differences in aesthetic psychology and ideology,the author's painting concept and form must also have qualitative differences.At the end of the paper,the author expounds the relationship between the Bashu Zen monk painting,Zen Buddhism and the cultural background of "Incorporating Zen into Confucianism",and sums up its artistic characteristics and its status in the Painting history,and also makes some thoughts on the theoretical significance of the Bashu Zen monk painting in the Art History of Southern Song Dynasty.