Zen and Modernity

This series contrasts Zen principles, with modernity, nature with urbanization, rationalism with intuition. Muromachi period (1392–1573) Japan was home to 12.5 Million people and Zen Buddhism dominated its culture. Currently, Japan’s population is 125 Million and it is a capitalist, modern, industrial nation. The Muromachi period ushered in a Chinese-style haboku (“splashed-ink”) ink painting. These Japanese ink-wash paintings were created to provide images of sights with an elevated spirituality, such as deep mountains and heavenly valleys where immortal beings resided.Even actual landscapes were painted as "ideal worlds" in which the scenery was comprised of abstract forms of mountains and rivers. The Zen Buddhist priest-painters , such as Sesshu and Shubun , likened the spontaneous brushwork and intuitively understood (rather than realistically depicted) forms to the spontaneous, intuitive experience of Chan enlightenment. They painted asymmetrical compositions, with emphasis on large areas of empty space.In their painting, the substance and the void complement each other.The void is not nothingness, but a space for imagination. I have added modern urban scenery to Muromachi Period ,Zen-inspired ,landscape ink paintings .In addition I turned them to nocturnal collages. The vast empty spaces and the rivers are now filled with cities. Still, the compositions maintain their beauty.The artificial and the nature converges and they co-exist in a peculiar harmony, hinting to a possible agreement between tradition and modernity, nature and culture.