"All painted buddhas are actual buddhas" by Hennegen
"When a buddha is painted, not only a clay altar or lump of earth is used, but the thirty-two marks, a blade of grass, and the cultivation of wisdom for incalculable eons are used. As a buddha has been painted on a single scroll in this way, all buddhas are painted buddhas, and all painted buddhas are actual buddhas."
This remark on paintings of the buddha reminds me of an experience I had in a painting class with a Tibetan Thangka painter in Mcleod Ganj, India. I was in town for a week and went to work with the painter for a few hours each day. The first day, I expected to jump straight into getting paint on the canvas--Thangka paintings are known for their incredibly fine detail work, which surely would occupy the bulk of my time in class. However, we spent the first two days practicing how to draw the Buddha. My teacher was emphatic. There was such specificity to adhere to when it came to proportions and positioning. How the hands were placed in the lap. The cross of the feet. The distance between the eyes.
This remark on paintings of the buddha reminds me of an experience I had in a painting class with a Tibetan Thangka painter in Mcleod Ganj, India. I was in town for a week and went to work with the painter for a few hours each day. The first day, I expected to jump straight into getting paint on the canvas--Thangka paintings are known for their incredibly fine detail work, which surely would occupy the bulk of my time in class. However, we spent the first two days practicing how to draw the Buddha. My teacher was emphatic. There was such specificity to adhere to when it came to proportions and positioning. How the hands were placed in the lap. The cross of the feet. The distance between the eyes.
On the third day, I showed him my sketch and he told me I could now proceed to painting. I selected declarative, bright hues for my painting. A blue buddha, a pink background, yellow around his head. To balance so many colors, I began to paint his pants a charcoal black. When my painting instructor saw this, he became distressed and told me it would be inauspicious to paint the blue Buddha this way. He'd given us a list of color options for the buddha, with different colors corresponding to different themes or focus (I wish I could recall the list, but this was back in 2010!). The charcoal pants were simply inappropriate for the blue Buddha. So I painted a design in salmon pink over the charcoal and my teacher was satisfied.
Now, as I reflect on this experience in light of the excerpt above, I gain a deeper appreciation for what may have motivated my teacher to ensure his students painted their buddhas with such care: "As a buddha has been painted on a single scroll in this way, all buddhas are painted buddhas, and all painted buddhas are actual buddhas." This endows each effort to paint he Buddha with incredible import. I would surely benefit from our discussion to better understand the relationship between particularity and singularity in the reading. The chapter opens: “All buddhas are realization; thus all things are realization. Yet, no buddhas or things have the same characteristics; none have the same mind. Although there are no identical characteristics or minds, at the moment of your actualization, numerous actualizations manifest without hindrance.” How is it that particularity exists in characteristics or minds, yet all participate in a singularity? So too for the relationship between representation and the actual: all buddhas are painted (or, representations of) buddha / all paintings (or representations) are buddha.
Now, as I reflect on this experience in light of the excerpt above, I gain a deeper appreciation for what may have motivated my teacher to ensure his students painted their buddhas with such care: "As a buddha has been painted on a single scroll in this way, all buddhas are painted buddhas, and all painted buddhas are actual buddhas." This endows each effort to paint he Buddha with incredible import. I would surely benefit from our discussion to better understand the relationship between particularity and singularity in the reading. The chapter opens: “All buddhas are realization; thus all things are realization. Yet, no buddhas or things have the same characteristics; none have the same mind. Although there are no identical characteristics or minds, at the moment of your actualization, numerous actualizations manifest without hindrance.” How is it that particularity exists in characteristics or minds, yet all participate in a singularity? So too for the relationship between representation and the actual: all buddhas are painted (or, representations of) buddha / all paintings (or representations) are buddha.
The first image is the painting I created; the second is a Thangka of my teacher's that hangs in my apartment today.
I like this. It seems important to realize that every imagined Buddha, whether painted, sculpted, or in the mind, is imagined in colors -- and every "real" Buddha is also in color, even (in so far as it is a visual object) constituted by colors.
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