Beomeosa Temple Seven Stars Painting

This is a Chilseongdo, a painting of the Seven Stars, preserved at Beomeosa Temple. A Chilseongdo depicts the Seven Stars received into Buddhism as guardian deities of the Dharma, personified in human form. This Chilseongdo is painted in colour on a silk ground. The composition centres on one Buddha image flanked by three further Buddha images on each side, together representing the Seven Star Buddhas, with child attendants depicted below each. Above the Seven Star Buddhas, marked off by a band of cloud motifs, groups of figures are shown divided into three clusters. The sky at the top of the picture is painted in ultramarine, the haloes around the figures' heads are coloured alternately in deep and pale green, and the robes are mainly in blue and purple, with the sashes picked out in black, blue, sky blue and purple to heighten the splendour. Gold leaf is used on the ground behind the Bhaisajyaguru Buddha at the top and on the ceremonial headdresses of the figures to left and right. Behind the Seven Star Buddhas, a lozenge pattern forms square compartments at whose corners raised dotted colouring creates concentric circles. The outlines of the figures are marked off in a darker colour than the fill colour of each area. According to the inscription in the lower centre of the picture, this Chilseongdo was made in the year Sinmyo of the Guangxu era, that is, the 28th year of King Gojong of Joseon (1891). The Chilseongdo of Beomeosa Temple is valuable both as a reference for 19th-century inscription formats, from the content recorded at the bottom of the picture, and for the lineage of monk painters active in the Yeongnam region in the late Joseon period, and it is a work that links the stylistic currents among the various iconographic types of the late Joseon period, especially the 19th century.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Geumjeong-gu, Busan

Designation

Cultural Heritage Material · 문화유산자료