Wabi-Sabi Wasabi

All I can say about this one is that when I finished this zen-like impressionistic landscape painting, I got a wabi-sabi reaction about it.

What’s wabi and sabi?
Both terms are very common in the Zen aesthetic sphere and these refer to the suggestion of feelings of solitude and desolation.
Wabi: quiet elegance
Sabi: elegant (quiet) simplicity

Zen paintings were frequently done using only sumi (ink) no colors were added and the brush work was quite simple in contrast with the kind of painting of the period. Contrary to what most people think, this sensation of loneliness is not a negative thing but a positive characteristic due to the fact that represents the simple and humble life in the mountain, therefore it is a depiction of the freedom and detachment from the material world.
According to the book “Zen and he fine arts” these are the seven characteristics of a Zen aesthetic painting:

-Asymmetry (being unbalanced)
-Simplicity (not being cluttered)
-Austere sublimity/Lofty dryness (being astringent and sublime, being astringent, advance in years and life; being seasoned)
-Naturalness (having no mind, no intent)
-Subtle profundity/Deep reserve (even one speck of dust contains everything and the “not a single thing” is inexhaustible)
-Freedom from attachment (“the rule of no rule”)
-Tranquility (not being disquieted and not being disquieting).

Hut in the mountain, snow and Haiku about loneliness.

About monkeys

One monkey has the dharma and the other is dharmaless!

Body concerns! He is looking quite pleased and what do we think about pleasure?! Aha!

Last year, I was really into the Mayan calendar thing, I found it really interesting and so with some friends we started studying it and suddenly I decided to live my life according to some things these ancient guys said about the universe and mankind. Anyway the first thing I learned is that in the Mayan calendar I’m a blue monkey, and I like blue, I really do but at first I rejected the idea of being born in the “monkey day”, because well I wasn’t much into monkeys, I didn’t like that primitive foolish animal at all, less to be one. The drawing that you can see in my profile represents the final conciliation after several disagreements. I even carved my hanko after this mayan sign, but now I don't like it at all because I found out that in Zen the monkey represents the deluded human being attached to the material stuff!.

Thief! thief! Monkeys are known for their skills to steal things, food most of the times.

Three monkeys, ones deluded, the other awaking.

Calligraphy too

Hakuin dedicated most of his life not only to painting but to calligraphy too and so there you go; when I told the sensei I wanted to write this haiku, he laughed;

野も山も
雪にとられて
なにもなし
-丈草

field and mountain
taken by the snow
nothing remains
-Naitou Jousou(1662-1704)

While writing this, he told me to think about the poem I was writing. A haiku about snow, a poem about nothing.

At first I found myself scrutinizing each character, its traces and position, how big it had to be, what direction should have, the balance of the whole etc… constantly looking at the example from the teacher. Well yeah, this technical approach didn’t turn out right. I was over thinking the whole thing; my traces seemed really awkward and then I realized what the teacher said, that I should just let it be, start writing straightforwardly without too much effort, and after that it started to work, pieces falling into place finally.
I felt I got it, this was not about kanjis, meanings, it wasn’t about words but about an image or more like an insight being exposed. So it turned out that if I wanted to write it properly then I had to let the brush slide without forcing it, reminded me of Dogen’s Instruction for the Cook really, lately everything remind me of Dogen.

What I learned from the sensei while doing this is that although there is a correct way to write in Japanese; a right way to depict each character following the order of its traces and all; it is also about catching a feeling and letting it out in the paper.
Among the last ones I did suddenly I realized there was a space in which the snow flakes fall down from the sky, there is a hint of perspective, but above all there is a feeling, a light feeling of cold white snow. Yatta!

Everything is light! everything is true! n_n

Paatii!

So I was talking the other night with my tai Buddhist roommate -who I love by the way- and we were talking about Zen... well, I was studying for the midterm and talking about Zen, she asked me If I knew Ikkyu-san’s cartoon, and yes, I couldn't resist telling her innocent being about some omitted facts about this priest’s life (like the blind girlfriend and the erotic poetry thing and all) and she got really stunned! It made me realize how crazy this people was xD but in a good way, I kept on telling her about other priests we’ve studied because I thought it'd be really interesting to see her reactions after all she is a Buddhist and suddenly it hit me!.
How about getting some of them together?
We talked about that and the whole situation suddenly turned hilarious and well we end up laughing with the absurd possibilities. Anyway, here it is... a Rinzai Soto Obaku veggie bosatsu Pure land party.Smile.

Radish

This image would enter in the category of a genre that depicts Buddha themes using vegetables called Yasai Nehan.There are many and really funny paintings of vegetables by Ito Jakuchu that you can search online, I did this because I truly think those are very, very zen in every sense, so I recommend you see Ito Jakuchu’s Yasai Nehan, they are hilarious. "Parinirvana (Death scene - Liberation)" is the name of the most well-known painting by this artist and it depicts the death of Shakyamuni who is represented by a japanese daikon sourrunded by his disciples depicted as different kinds of vegetables, some twisting and rolling like the followers in despair. (kawaii!)

"All sentient things without exception have the Buddha-Nature. "

- Nirvana Sutra

Do vegetables have Buddha-nature?

The first thing I thought about when I did this is how lucky a radish is, he can’t speak. We provide names for things to take over these, and so we are deluded; instead of experiencing things just as they are we tend to define it using our functional conventional system of signs. We are tied to words, not only because there is a need for communication but also because language is the ultimate instrumental tool to manipulate others and reality.

It makes me wonder about… is language an external phenomenon, or is something internal, inherit?
Before learning, are there words in our minds from the beginning? What would happen if we were to turn off the language switch? Is that what enlightenment is about? Is that what happened to Jill Bolten Taylor?

Basically what I understand about Zen till now is that maybe if there were no words then we would become one with all of the things there will be no separation, classification nor delusive interpretations of things, just experience.
Because we can’t be aware of thing’s true essence, we just provide names for these perceptions, it is convenient.
In our present society Language is a way to authenticate things, therefore “give them existence”. Something that is not labeled has no existence to us, if we were to encounter an unknown object we would try to dissipate its mystifying veil by relating it to the pack of things we already know in order to mistakenly comprehend it and take control over it by means of a word. It’s just what we do, because we like to be in control of our surrounding.

But vegetables don’t do that, do they? They just are, and stay there... growing happily with their Buddha minds experiencing events immediately, bugs, earth, rain… and What is true self according to Dogen but the pure experience itself. So here are some points that I've come up with about this topic and surely anyone thought of these before, these being,

A radish can’t name things (not that we know anyways).

It cannot kill…unless... they are decayed or infested, or we don’t prepare them properly! Still is not their burden, it is not intentional so it doesn’t count.

Intellection is the biggest obstacle to Zen experience, and… well radishes don’t have intelligence, vegetables don’t think, so they don’t have deluded minds (do they have minds!?), anyway the point is that maybe they experience things just as they are, because they just are.

So they grow and vegetate, being still and silent (very zazenish of them) and later they provide us with delicious healthy zen vitamins. How great, unselfish, enlightened beings ne! '

And finally if we really think about it, there is no nourishment in the world better for us than vegetables; they provide us with what we need to function in this world, and maybe, why not, with some Zen sprinkle as well.

"Seeing forms with your eyes, hearing sounds with your ears, smelling odors with your nose, tasting flavors with you tongue, every movement or state is all your mind. At every moment, where language can't go, that's your mind" -fragment of The Zen teaching of Bodhidharma.