Page 44 - japanese and korean art Utterberg Collection Christie's March 22 2022

涅槃寂静 | THE COLLECTION OF DAVID AND NAYDA UTTERBERG (LOTs 1-20)

two pantheons. In principle, Japanese kami were unrepresentable,
and had to be depicted in the guise of an assumed figure, such as
a courtier or even a Buddhist deity. In the former case, the kami
were often accompanied by figural depictions of their eternal
Buddhist manifestations, which were typically painted in roundels
above, as in Tenjin Visiting China. Such dual depictions are rare in
Tenjin paintings. Examples include works in the Virginia Museum
of Fine Arts and the monastery Toji (of the Shingon school) in
Kyoto, both of which depict Tenjin as a seated Japanese courtier,
accompanied above by Eleven-Headed Avalokiteshvara. Another
example in the shrine Osaka Tenmangu depicts the Sanskrit “seed
syllable” that symbolizes the bodhisattva above Tenjin. In addition,
a late-fifteenth-century painting of Tenjin Visiting China includes
a depiction of Eleven-Headed Avalokiteshvara as a small deity
(kebutsu) in Tenjin’s headgear. The present version, however, is
unique among extant works in portraying Tenjin as visualized in
the Zen context accompanied by the bodhisattva in its roundel
frame.
The accompanying inscription follows the normal pattern of Zen
commentary on this subject by describing the appearance of Tenjin
and the legend surrounding his visit to China. After then casting
suspicion on the plausibility of Tenjin’s continental sojourn, it
attributes the unlikely dharma transmission to his miraculous
powers. The inscription, dated the twelfth month of 1430, is signed
by the monk Yoka Shinko (d. 1437) for a certain Nan’un Shinto,
a fellow monk affiliated with the monastery Tofukuji. Close
examination of Tenjin Visiting China reveals that the sections that
bear the inscription, Eleven-Headed Avalokiteshvara, and Tenjin are
all separate sheets of paper. The age and state of preservation of the
sheets are indistinguishable, as is the painting style used for Tenjin
and his Buddhist counterpart.; the inscription, furthermore, appears
to acknowledge the presence of Eleven-Headed Avalokiteshvara
in the work. Therefore, there is ample reason to believe that all
sections were originally part of the same painting.
Little is known about Yoka Shinko, other than the fact that he was
appointed abbot of Tofukuji in 1428. Stylistically, Tenjin Visiting
China closely accords with some dozen extant works inscribed
by monks affiliated with Tofukuji, suggesting that these works
were produced by semi-professional monk-painters based at the
monastery. These monastic artisans would have been followers of
Kichizan Mincho (1532–1431), believed to have been the painter
most responsible for establishing the basic template and formal
characteristics of pictorial representations of Tenjin Visiting China.
(Reprinted from Awakenings: Zen Figure Painting in Medieval Japan,
courtesy of Japan Society, Inc.).