Hanging Painting of Seonseoksa Temple, Seongju (The Vulture Peak Assembly)

This is a gwaebul, a huge Buddhist painting hung outdoors for great ceremonies, made in 1702, the 28th year of King Sukjong's reign, by the monk-painters Takhwi, Beophae, Seoljam, Seongjing and others. At the centre of the composition a large image of Sakyamuni Buddha stands flanked by the bodhisattvas Manjusri and Samantabhadra, while at the top of the scene the two disciples Ananda and Kasyapa are shown from the waist up with their palms joined in prayer. The two attendant figures are placed a step ahead of the principal Buddha and overlap him, creating a sense of depth and three-dimensional space. Rather than the usual earth-touching mudra or preaching mudra, the principal Buddha's right hand is raised to shoulder height, holding a lotus branch. The painting's inscription clearly records that it was made as "an image of the Vulture Peak Assembly," so this iconography is understood to symbolically combine the Seon (Zen) anecdote of the Buddha silently holding up a flower before his assembly with the doctrine of the unity of Seon and doctrinal Buddhism that flourished in the Joseon period. This work is in fact the earliest known Buddhist painting, among all such paintings identified to date, to depict the theme of the Buddha holding up a flower. The Vulture Peak Assembly hanging painting of Seonseoksa Temple is highly significant for tracing the transmission of Buddhist painting iconography: it was produced relatively early, it occupies a pioneering position among images of Sakyamuni holding a lotus, and it served as the model for the surviving Treasure-designated hanging painting of Yongmunsa Temple, Yecheon (1705). Its refined and accomplished sense of colour and brushwork also make it representative of gwaebul painting in the first half of the 18th century.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Seongju, Gyeongbuk

Designation

Treasure · 보물