Seosan Cheonjangsa Temple Amitabha Altar Painting

The Amitabha Altar Painting of Cheonjangsa Temple is the finest and most original work in Sanggyeom's oeuvre, showing a highly individual painting style. Its composition centres on the principal image of Amitabha Buddha, surrounded by the Four Great Bodhisattvas, the Four Heavenly Kings, disciples, the Dragon King and the Dragon Maiden. The principal Buddha, seated on a high pedestal, occupies the centre of the picture, while the two attendant bodhisattvas, Avalokiteśvara (Gwaneum) and Mahasthamaprapta (Daeseji), stand on either side at the front, holding respectively a kundika water vase and a ruyi sceptre (a curved ceremonial wand). Inside these two bodhisattvas stand two child attendant figures holding objects in their hands, a very unusual feature; these child figures are thought to represent heavenly boys (cheondong), which were customarily placed at the upper left and right of a composition, and are presumed to be related to the 'good and evil boy attendants' that frequently appear in paintings of Ksitigarbha and the Ten Kings from the late nineteenth century. Since there are almost no other examples of such attendants appearing in an Amitabha painting, this is thought to be a distinctive feature unique to Sanggyeom. Red is used as the dominant colour, with green and deep blue as secondary colours. Sanggyeom took part in Buddhist temple work at Yongjusa Temple, King Jeongjo's royal temple in Gyeonggi Province, which has led to suggestions that he may have been a painter of the Dohwaseo (the royal Bureau of Painting) active during the reigns of Kings Yeongjo and Jeongjo; it seems more likely, however, that he was a monk-painter who took part in court Buddhist projects as corvée labour. Nonetheless, it is certain that Sanggyeom was a painter whose skill was recognised highly enough at the time for him to take part in a royal court project such as that at Yongjusa Temple. Sanggyeom is also known to have been active in 1780 at Bongseonsa Temple in Namyangju and elsewhere, working mainly at temples in Gyeonggi Province, but as he also left works over a wide area including Gyeongsang and Jeolla Provinces, the location of Gwaneumsa Temple — the original temple for which the Amitabha painting now held at Cheonjangsa Temple was made — cannot be identified.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Seosan, Chungnam

Designation

Provincial Tangible Heritage · 시도유형문화유산