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Buddhism Today and Aesthetic Creativity by Ananda Guruge Pdf
This book covers many areas of Dr. Guruge's interests in the field of Buddhist studies and action. He shares these views, opinions, observations and concerns with many audiences in all parts of the world over the last decade. The decision to compile them into a single volume is in response to many requests he has received for copies.
For many of us, the return of Zen conjures up images of rock gardens and gently flowing waterfalls. We think of mindfulness and meditation, immersion in a state of being where meaning is found through simplicity. Zen lore has been absorbed by Western practitioners and pop culture alike, yet there is a specific area of this ancient tradition that hasn’t been fully explored in the West. Now, in The Zen of Creativity, American Zen master John Daido Loori presents a book that taps the principles of the Zen arts and aesthetic as a means to unlock creativity and find freedom in the various dimensions of our existence. Loori dissolves the barriers between art and spirituality, opening up the possibility of meeting life with spontaneity, grace, and peace. Zen Buddhism is steeped in the arts. In spiritual ways, calligraphy, poetry, painting, the tea ceremony, and flower arranging can point us toward our essential, boundless nature. Brilliantly interpreting the teachings of the artless arts, Loori illuminates various elements that awaken our creativity, among them still point, the center of each moment that focuses on the tranquility within; simplicity, in which the creative process is uncluttered and unlimited, like a cloudless sky; spontaneity, a way to navigate through life without preconceptions, with a freshness in which everything becomes new; mystery, a sense of trust in the unknown; creative feedback, the systematic use of an audience to receive noncritical input about our art; art koans, exercises based on paradoxical questions that can be resolved only through artistic expression. Loori shows how these elements interpenetrate and function not only in art, but in all our endeavors. Beautifully illustrated and punctuated with poems and reflections from Loori’s own spiritual journey, The Zen of Creativity presents a multilayered, bottomless source of insight into our creativity. Appealing equally to spiritual seekers, artists, and veteran Buddhist practitioners, this book is perfect for those wishing to discover new means of self-awareness and expression—and to restore equanimity and freedom amid the vicissitudes of our lives.
Author : Earle J. Coleman Publisher : State University of New York Press Page : 264 pages File Size : 53,9 Mb Release : 1998-02-27 Category : Religion ISBN : 0791499502
Creativity and Spirituality by Earle J. Coleman Pdf
From the architecture of Frank Lloyd Wright to the rock gardens of Zen Buddhism, Coleman explores applied, fine, and folk arts in order to uncover points of coalescence between art and religion. Drawing from six living faiths (Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, and Taoism), this book philosophically analyzes relations between art and religion in order to explain how the concepts "art," "beauty," "creativity," and "aesthetic experience" find their place or counterparts in religious discourse and experience. Coleman repeatedly shows that aesthetic ideas can serve as bridges to spiritual categories, as when he relates aesthetic bliss to "the peace that passes all understanding." The author follows a three-fold approach; first, he examines ideas and motifs from religious classics in world literature, such as Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching and The Interior Castle by Teresa of Avila, in order to relate them to aesthetic phenomena. Second, he turns to the statements of artists, such as Leo Tolstoy, Vincent van Gogh, Paul Gauguin, Shih-t'ao, and Wassily Kandinsky, for themes and practices that have religious significance. Third, he analyzes and evaluates the writings of various theoreticians—philosophers, theologians, art critics, sociologists, and psychologists—on the relations between art and religion. Coleman demonstrates, for example, that Martin Buber's I-Thou relationship captures much that is central to art, creativity, and aesthetic experience as well as to religious life. Among the themes that receive sustained treatment are: the varieties of union in art and religion, the child as a paradigm for artists and saints, and creativity as essential to religion. Finally, the author critically weighs proposed distinctions between art and religion and between the broader categories of the aesthetic and the spiritual, rejecting some and showing how others are compatible with his proposal that the aesthetic and the spiritual are cognate categories.
Artistic Visions and the Promise of Beauty by Kathleen M. Higgins,Shakti Maira,Sonia Sikka Pdf
This volume examines the motives behind rejections of beauty often found within contemporary art practice, where much critically acclaimed art is deliberately ugly and alienating. It reflects on the nature and value of beauty, asking whether beauty still has a future in art and what role it can play in our lives generally. The volume discusses the possible “end of art,” what art is, and the relation between art and beauty beyond their historically Western horizons to include perspectives from Asia. The individual chapters address a number of interrelated issues, including: art, beauty and the sacred; beauty as a source of joy and consolation; beauty as a bridge between the natural and the human; beauty and the human form; the role of curatorial practice in defining art; order and creativity; and the distinction between art and craft. The volume offers a valuable addition to cross-cultural dialogue and, in particular, to the sparse literature on art and beauty in comparative context. It demonstrates the relevance of the rich tradition of Asian aesthetics and the vibrant practices of contemporary art in Asia to Western discussions about the future of art and the role of beauty.
Author : Jacquelynn Baas,Mary Jane Jacob Publisher : Univ of California Press Page : 284 pages File Size : 55,5 Mb Release : 2004 Category : Art ISBN : 0520243463
Buddha Mind in Contemporary Art by Jacquelynn Baas,Mary Jane Jacob Pdf
"Eminently readable and extremely meaningful. The contributors tackle essential questions about the relationship of art and life. The book is also very timely, offering a way to approach Buddhism through unexpected channels."--Lynn Gumpert, Director, Grey Art Gallery, New York University
Tragic Beauty in Whitehead and Japanese Aesthetics by Steve Odin Pdf
The present volume endeavors to make a contribution to contemporary Whitehead studies by clarifying his axiological process metaphysics, including his theory of values, concept of aesthetic experience, and doctrine of beauty, along with his philosophy of art, literature and poetry. Moreover, it establishes an east-west dialogue focusing on how Alfred North Whitehead’s process aesthetics can be clarified by the traditional Japanese Buddhist sense of evanescent beauty. As this east-west dialogue unfolds it is shown that there are many striking points of convergence between Whitehead’s process aesthetics and the traditional Japanese sense of beauty. However, the work especially focuses on two of Whitehead’s aesthetic categories, including the penumbral beauty of darkness and the tragic beauty of perishability, while further demonstrating parallels with the two Japanese aesthetic categories of yûgen and aware. It is clarified how both Whitehead and the Japanese tradition have articulated a poetics of evanescence that celebrates the transience of aesthetic experience and the ephemerality of beauty. Finally it is argued that both Whitehead and Japanese tradition develop an aesthetics of beauty as perishability culminating in a religio-aesthetic vision of tragic beauty and its reconciliation in the supreme ecstasy of peace or nirvana.
Art, Creativity, and the Sacred by Diane Apostolos-Cappadona Pdf
Contributors include: Doug and Linda Altshuler, Mircea Eliade, Langdon Gilkey, Barbara Novak, and many others. "A seminal work... widely adopted". -- Religious Studies Review
The Creative South by Andrea Acri,Peter Sharrock Pdf
This edited volume programmatically reconsiders the creative contribution of the littoral and insular regions of Maritime Asia to shaping new paradigms in the Buddhist and Hindu art and architecture of the mediaeval Asian world. Far from being a mere southern conduit for the maritime circulation of Indic religions, in the period from ca. the 7th to the 14th century those regions transformed across mainland and island polities the rituals, icons, and architecture that embodied these religious insights with a dynamism that often eclipsed the established cultural centres in Northern India, Central Asia, and mainland China. This collective body of work brings together new research aiming to recalibrate the importance of these innovations in art and architecture, thereby highlighting the cultural creativity of the monsoon-influenced Southern rim of the Asian landmass. "Although Maritime Asia in mediaeval times was not as densely populated as the agrarian hinterland, Asia’s coasts were highly urbanized. The region from southern India to south China was a heterogeneous blend of cultures, leavened with a strong interest in trade. This cosmopolitan society afforded plentiful opportunities for artists to find patrons and develop individual styles and aesthetic sensibilities. In the bustling ports of Asia’s south coast, rulers sought to embellish their prestige and attract foreign merchants by sponsoring the development of monumental complexes and centres of learning and debate. These educational institutions attracted teachers from all over Asia, and in their cloisters they developed new intellectual frameworks which were reflected in works of art and architecture. Scholars moved frequently by sea, influencing and being influenced by other foreigners such as Japanese and central Asians who were also attracted to these places. This very variety has hindered scholarly research in the past. This volume contributes to the endeavour to show how Maritime Asia was not an incoherent jumble of misunderstood influences from better-known civilizations; there was a pattern to this creativity, which the authors in this collection clarify for us. The maritime world of Asia may have lain on the margins of the land, but it provided a physical and intellectual medium through which artistic ideas from east and west flowed freely. Maritime Asia also made significant original contributions which hold their own with those of the hinterland of the Asian continent. Unconstrained by the burden of static hierarchical courts, the peoples of Maritime Asia built on the inspiration provided by a hybrid society to demonstrate a high degree of artistic originality while testing but not breaking the link with conventional iconography."-- Professor John Miksic, Department of Southeast Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore (NUS) "The collective objective of this two-volume work is to give substance to the oft cited mantra that mediaeval maritime Southeast Asia was as much an innovative contributor to, as a recipient, in the cultural conversations that took place across the Bay of Bengal and South China Sea. In bracketing these studies between the 7th and 14th centuries, the editors have drawn into focus two key traditions that are explicated in texts, ritual art and architecture and religious landscapes of this period: tantric Buddhism and esoteric Shaivism. A great strength of these studies is this focus, for which the editors are to be commended. The chapters contain much that represents significant milestones in building new understanding in the field, including overdue recognition of the importance of Southeast Asian esoteric Buddhist practice in shaping Chinese Buddhism. Nowhere did the architects of the religious landscape of early Southeast Asia think of themselves as being on the periphery, or as outsiders, looking in. Rather, they knowingly imbued their tirthas and sacred centres with the same authority as those in India and created religious edifices that were on occasions beyond India’s experience. I highly commend this publication to anyone with an interest in bringing a wider lens to the study of Indian esoteric religious practices and to understanding the relationship of early Hindu-Buddhist Southeast Asia to the wider Asian world." -- John Guy, Senior Curator of South and Southeast Asian Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York "The Creative South is a rich compendium of scholarship concerning the religious art of Southeast Asia and its ties to India in the period beginning in the 8th century. It was a time when merchants were crisscrossing the seas from India to China and when advocates of innovative doctrines and rituals were finding ready support among the rulers of the varied kingdoms. From the identification of images embraced by the seafarers to the mysteries of the fire shrines in Cambodian temples, from the funerary beliefs of Odisha to the unique character of the Javanese Ramayana, these eighteen studies provide fresh understandings of the patterns of reception and innovation." -- Hiram Woodward, Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Quincy Scott Curator of Asian Art Emeritus, The Walters Art Museum
In the Realm of the Lotus by Sangharakshita (Bhikshu),Sangharakshita,J. O. Mallander Pdf
In this interview, which was conducted for Finnish television, the Buddhist monk Sangharakshita (formerly London-born Dennis Lingwood) discusses his belief that a true work of art offers a symbol of spiritual communication. Included among his reflections are angels as messengers, the primacy of colour in the transformation of consciousness, and the possibility of reaching higher states of awareness from the dream state.
Author : Steve Odin Publisher : State University of New York Press Page : 274 pages File Size : 40,5 Mb Release : 1983-06-30 Category : Philosophy ISBN : 9781438414911
Process Metaphysics and Hua-Yen Buddhism by Steve Odin Pdf
This study establishes a comprehensive transcultural dialogue between Whitehead's process metaphysics and East Asian Hua-yen Buddhism, including both the profound parallels and the doctrinal debates that arise between these two traditions. To advance this dialogue, Dr. Odin has called upon several other Western hermeneutical systems in order to radically reinterpret Hua-yen modes of thought: phenomenology, depth psychology, linguistic analysis, and dialectical discourse. Of special interest is Dr. Odin's exposition of Korean Hua-yen (or Hwaom) Buddhism, including a full translation of the famous Ocean Seal (with Autocommentary) composed by Uisang (625-702), the first patriarch of Korean Hua-yen Buddhism. This is the first published translation of a major Korean Buddhist's treatise into English.
Creative Symbols of Tantric Buddhism by Sangharakshita Pdf
Tantric Buddhism is concerned with the direct experience of who we are and what we can become. Its sole aim is to help us realize our potential for profound wisdom and unbounded compassion by transforming the energy locked in by old habits, fears and narrow views. For the Tantra this experience is beyond words and thought. But it can be evoked with the help of symbols. Without the help of a reliable guide one could easily get lost or overwhelmed in this unfamiliar world of symbols. Sangharakshita is such a guide.
Contemporary Daoism, Organic Relationality, and Curriculum of Integrative Creativity by Hongyu Wang Pdf
Creativity in the West is often perceived as “cutting edge” and “ground-breaking” in a singular act of giving birth to the new. However, to what degree has this model of breaking away from others and the world contributed to the current crisis in education, society, and ecology even before the tragic COVID-19 pandemic and responses to it? How can our reimagining of creativity contribute to the mutual flourishing of humanity and of relations between humans and the planet? Daoist creativity, based upon relationality and interdependence, has much to offer to today’s curriculum as a complicated conversation to sustain life and renew the world. Integrative, emergent, embodied, co-creative, and ecological, Daoist creativity has a built-in opening to difference through the organic relationality of Yin/Yang dynamics. This book focuses on one essential thread in Daoism—integrative creativity through organic relationality—and weaves its interplay with Western thought through multiple and intertwined dimensions of curriculum. Exploring Dao as dynamic and setting creative curriculum in motion, this book juxtaposes the notion of Wuwei and self-organization to conceptualize emergent classroom dynamics, and re-envisions the inner landscape of education through negotiating dialogues between the Jungian psyche and Daoist dynamics. Further, it explores gendered implications of Daoism to interact with feminism and formulates the pursuit of inner and outer peace through creative harmony to inform nonviolence curriculum. Synthesizing cross-cultural insights and wisdom, it provides an in-depth and intuitive understanding of the interactions between Daoist and Western creativity and elaborates a curriculum of integrative creativity for students, teachers, and their educational community. Let us all attend to the urgent call for individual and collective awakenings and for creativity that connects. Praise for Contemporary Daoism, Organic Relationality, and Curriculum of Integrative Creativity: "Hongyu Wang’s book on Daoism is a treasure. It is beautifully written and includes a diverse literature that demonstrates her impressive scholarship. She explores the relevance of Daoism’s ancient wisdom to many current issues including gender, nonviolence, peace education, as well as teaching and learning. This is an important addition to growing literature on Daoism. In a time of division we need Daoism’s cosmic perspective on how we can live peacefully and harmoniously on this earth." ~ Jack Miller The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education University of Toronto "One barrier to meaningful educational reform is our inability to imagine things differently. Wang’s study offers a set of lenses drawn from Chinese Daoism that could stimulate meaningful educational reform by envisioning a curriculum that moves beyond analytical reasoning toward more peaceful, humane, and ecologically sustainable ways of teaching, learning, and knowing. Along the way, Wang explores the links between Daoism and complexity theory and Daoism’s compatibilities and contrasts with aspects of Western philosophy, including recent scholarship on eco-feminism. Educators will be intrigued by this study of Daoism as a form of embodied curriculum that works toward the development of authentic personhood and transformative interconnectedness through an emphasis on lived experience in tandem with intellectual developmentand they will be inspired to examine and rethink their current practice." ~ Gay Garland Reed Professor Emerita, University of Hawaii "Honyu Wang’s book offers us a solution for nowadays crises like social and ecological ones, by pointing out that the integrative creativity and curriculum is the key...Her ideas are accessible and can enrich our perspective as educationists. The novelty and uniqueness of the book is that it makes a bridge between Western culture and East culture, between past and present and it is also a bridge from today to the future of the entire Earth." ~ Maria Butucea, Teacher Training Department, Technical University of Civil Engineering, Bucharest
The Theory of Beauty in the Classical Aesthetics of Japan by T. Izutsu,Toyo Izutsu Pdf
The Japanese sense of beauty as actualized in innumerable works of art, both linguistic and non-linguistic, has often been spoken of as something strange to, and remote from, the Western taste. It is, in fact, so radically different from what in the West is ordinarily associated with aesthetic experience that it even tends to give an impression of being mysterious, enigmatic or esoteric. This state of affairs comes from the fact that there is a peculiar kind of metaphysics, based on a realization of the simultaneous semantic articulation of consciousness and the external reality, dominating the whole functional domain of the Japanese sense of beauty, without an understanding of which the so-called 'mystery' of Japanese aesthetics would remain incomprehensible. The present work primarily purports to clarify the keynotes of the artistic experiences that are typical of Japanese culture, in terms of a special philosophical structure underlying them. It consists of two main parts: (1) Preliminary Essays, in which the major philosophical ideas relating to beauty will be given a theoretical elucidation, and (2) a selection of Classical Texts representative of Japanese aesthetics in widely divergent fields of linguistic and extra-linguistic art such as the theories of waka-poetry, Noh play, the art of tea, and haiku. The second part is related to the first by way of a concrete illustration, providing as it does philological materials on which are based the philosophical considerations of the first part.
The Creative South by Andrea Acri,Peter D. Sharrock Pdf
This edited volume programmatically reconsiders the creative contribution of the littoral and insular regions of Maritime Asia to shaping new paradigms in the Buddhist and Hindu art and architecture of the mediaeval Asian world. Far from being a mere southern conduit for the maritime circulation of Indic religions, in the period from ca. the 7th to the 14th century those regions transformed across mainland and island polities the rituals, icons, and architecture that embodied these religious insights with a dynamism that often eclipsed the established cultural centres in Northern India, Central Asia, and mainland China. This collective body of work brings together new research aiming to recalibrate the importance of these innovations in art and architecture, thereby highlighting the cultural creativity of the monsoon-influenced Southern rim of the Asian landmass. "Although Maritime Asia in mediaeval times was not as densely populated as the agrarian hinterland, Asia's coasts were highly urbanized. The region from southern India to south China was a heterogeneous blend of cultures, leavened with a strong interest in trade. This cosmopolitan society afforded plentiful opportunities for artists to find patrons and develop individual styles and aesthetic sensibilities. In the bustling ports of Asia's south coast, rulers sought to embellish their prestige and attract foreign merchants by sponsoring the development of monumental complexes and centres of learning and debate. These educational institutions attracted teachers from all over Asia, and in their cloisters they developed new intellectual frameworks which were reflected in works of art and architecture. Scholars moved frequently by sea, influencing and being influenced by other foreigners such as Japanese and central Asians who were also attracted to these places. This very variety has hindered scholarly research in the past. This volume contributes to the endeavour to show how Maritime Asia was not an incoherent jumble of misunderstood influences from better-known civilizations; there was a pattern to this creativity, which the authors in this collection clarify for us. The maritime world of Asia may have lain on the margins of the land, but it provided a physical and intellectual medium through which artistic ideas from east and west flowed freely. Maritime Asia also made significant original contributions which hold their own with those of the hinterland of the Asian continent. Unconstrained by the burden of static hierarchical courts, the peoples of Maritime Asia built on the inspiration provided by a hybrid society to demonstrate a high degree of artistic originality while testing but not breaking the link with conventional iconography."-- Professor John Miksic, Department of Southeast Asian Studies, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore (NUS)
