Hamyang Yeonggaksasansin Buddhist Painting

This sansintaeng (mountain-spirit painting), formerly enshrined in the Samseong-gak (Hall of the Three Sages) of Yeonggaksa Temple, Hamyang, is currently kept separately by the temple. Its ground material is a coarse, loosely woven silk, and it is mounted in a framed format rather than as a hanging scroll. The painting depicts the mountain spirit seated astride a tiger's back. On the reverse is a Jeonsin Sari Bohyeop Darani (a Buddhist dharani invoking the relics of the Buddha's whole body) written in red ink, and below it an inscription added in black ink. At the time of its making, the picture surface was set at a slight angle within its frame; over time the frame has warped, tilting the surface further to the left as viewed. Because of the long years since its production and inadequate care, the silk has flaked away in the tiger section at the bottom and in the cloud section at the upper right, and soot together with discolouration of the pigments has spread across the top of the painting. The overall composition places a large tiger, depicted at roughly half the size of the picture, together with the mountain spirit seated on its back, prominently at the centre, while a small guardian deity stands with a sword at the lower left and two small child attendants are placed behind the mountain spirit. Shown in a three-quarter frontal pose with his gaze turned to the right, the white-haired mountain spirit wears a topknot cap, his white beard streaming and his chest bared, with both legs set astride the tiger's back. His right hand, raised to chest height, holds a staff to whose end a fly-whisk and a sutra scroll are tied, while his lowered left hand holds a banana-leaf fan. The tiger bearing him, standing firm, has large, bell-like eyes and its mouth slightly open to show its teeth; with leopard-like spots and a tail raised in an S-shape, it is rendered with the engaging charm of tigers in folk paintings. A guardian deity standing firmly with a sword at the lower-left corner makes this an especially unusual sansin painting. Behind the mountain spirit, on either side, a heavenly boy and a heavenly girl are depicted holding offerings, while the rest of the background is left blank; along the upper edge, clouds coloured in red, green and yellow are painted, with part of a pine tree shown among the clouds at the upper right. The colouring is mainly red and green, with ochre and pale blue-green also used; the mountain spirit's robe is coloured red and the fields are coloured green, with the robe's pattern picked out here and there in square gold leaf. The tiger is coloured with an ochre base, shaded with white along its edges, and its fur is rendered with short, fine black-ink lines set closely together. An inscription cartouche against a vermilion ground at the bottom centre of the painting records that it was made and enshrined in the third month of the sinmyo year, the eleventh year of the Daoguang reign (1831), and that the painter was Cheonyeo. An inscription added on the reverse further records in more detail that the painting was produced during work on a hubultaeng for Seojinam Hermitage on Bangjangsan Mountain and during a gasa ceremony (a ritual for dedicating monastic robes), and was then enshrined in the Sansin-gak (Mountain Spirit Hall) of Yeonggaksa Temple on Deogyusan Mountain. Cheonyeo was a monk-painter active at Seonamsa Temple in Jeolla-do in the early to mid-19th century, who left behind many fine Buddhist paintings; in particular, the sansin painting he produced at Seonamsa Temple in 1847 is similar to this one, though painted in an even more playful, painterly, ink-wash style. Among the sansin paintings designated as Gyeongsangnam-do cultural heritage are the Sansin Painting of Jeongchwiam in Sancheong and the Sansin Painting of Yongmunsa Temple in Namhae, both treasures of cultural heritage material; in particular, the Jeongchwiam painting, made in 1833, likewise shows the mountain spirit riding a tiger. However, the Yeonggaksa painting was made two years earlier still, and also shows brushwork, pigments and colouring a level above the other.

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Where it is

Region

Hamyang, Gyeongnam

Designation

Cultural Heritage Material · 문화유산자료