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Buddhist monastery of the 7th century ad to first half of the 8th, in the valley of the Vakhsh River, 12 km east of Kurgan-Tyube, southern Tajikistan. During this early medieval period it belonged to Vakhsh (U-sha in Chinese sources), one of the 27 domains of Tokharistan. Excavations between 1960 and 1975 by the Academy of Sciences, Tajikistan, and the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, exposed the entire site; most of the finds are on loan to the Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg. The buildings, which covered an area of 100×50 m, were constructed of mud-bricks (c. 490×250×110 mm) and rammed earth, with walls surviving to a height of 5.5 to 6.0 m. The site comprised two square complexes linked by an enfilade of three rooms (see fig. (a)). The south-eastern complex or monastery (b) had domed cells (c) for monks, a hall or refectory (d), service quarters, store-rooms and a small sanctuary (e). An open courtyard in the centre had a fired brick path across it, linking the enfilade to the sanctuary. A corridor around the perimeter of the courtyard was divided into four right-angled sections by a deep iwan, or vestibule, in the middle of each side. One of these vestibules led into the sanctuary, the second into the meeting-hall, the third into the enfilade and the fourth to the monastery exit (j) and also on to a vaulted ramp (k) that originally gave access to the roof and the now lost second storey....

Chinese, 12th – 13th century, male.

Painter. Figures.

Song dynasty.

Bo Liangyu was a member of the academy of painting during the reign of Emperor Ningzong (1195-1225). He devoted himself to painting Taoist and Buddhist figures.

Chinese, 14th century, male.

Active in the first half of the 14th century, during the Yuan dynasty.

Painter.

Bo Ziting was a Buddhist painter from Jiading (Jiangsu) who painted rocks and flowers.

Chinese, 14th century, male.

Born in Qiantang (Zhejiang).

Monk-painter.

Ding Qingji was a Taoist monk who painted portraits of Buddhist and Taoist figures in the styles of Li Song and Ma Lin.

Korean, 7th century, male.

Active in the early 7th century.

Painter.

Doncho was a Korean Buddhist monk from the state of Koguryo, who probably arrived in Japan in 610, bringing with him the knowledge of making colours, paper and ink. In this way not only Buddhist art but also a new technique and new materials were introduced into Japan, and would subsequently form the basis of Japanese art. According to the guide of the Horyu-ji temple in Nara in the 1920s, the murals in the ...

Japanese, 14th century, male.

Active 1350-1395.

Painter.

Eiga specialised in Buddhist painting and is one of the earliest representatives of Muromachi ink painting. The honorific title ‘hogen’ was bestowed on him.

He probably painted the Portrait of Prince Shokotu before 1351, a work that has since disappeared, whilst his ...

Japanese, 11th century, male.

Active during the first half of the 11th century.

Sculptor.

Enkai was a Buddhist monk from Mount Shigi near Nara. He was one of the first ­sculptors to use the yosegi (joined-wood) style of carving, whereby monumental sculp­- tures were made from several different blocks of wood that had been carved separately and then put together. Until that time, these large wooden figures had been carved using the ichiboku technique, meaning out of a single block of wood. Enkai’s famous seated statue of ...

Japanese, 15th century, male.

Active during the late 15th and early 16th century.

Born 1504; died 1520.

Painter.

Gakuo was a Zen monk painter at the time when ink painting in Japan was developing in Zen Buddhist circles before it spread to the laity. Inspired by the work of his master Shubun (active ...

Japanese, 12th century, male.

Born 1146; died 1206.

Painter. Religious subjects.

Gensho was a priest at the Getsujo-in temple on Mount Koyasan. He specialised in painting Buddhist subjects.

Chinese, 9th – 10th century, male.

Born 832, in Lanxi (Zhejiang); died 912.

Painter.

Guanxiu was a Chan Buddhist monk. At the age of seven he was sent to a Chan monastery, then, still at an early age, he left for Jianxi, where he painted portraits of arhats in the temple of the Hall of the Cloud. In 894, he was sent to Hangzhou, where he continued to decorate temple walls with portraits of arhats. In 896 he went to the court of Changsha (Hunan), but, becoming involved in an intrigue, had to flee and finally settled in Chengdu (Sichuan), after travelling through the southern provinces. There the King of Shu bestowed upon him the ‘Great Master of the Chan Moon’....

Korean, 6th century, male.

Painter.

Buddhism arrived in Japan from China (via Korea) in the second half of the 6th century AD. With it came Buddhist art and the techniques and materials on which Japanese art would be built. Although nothing is known of the life of Hakuka, he is known to have been one of the Korean artists who, together with monks and architects, went to settle in Japan in 588. As such, he contributed to the spread of Buddhist art in Japan. He came from the Korean kingdom of Paekche, known in Japanese as Kudara....

Chinese, 8th century, male.

Active during the second half of the 8th century.

Painter. Horses.

Although Han Gan painted figures, notably Buddhist frescoes, he is known principally as a horse painter, and the subject was elevated to the status of a genre partly on account of him. The importance of this genre may be explained by the significant role horses played during the Tang dynasty in China (618-907); the tool of conquest and of expansion towards central Asia, they were directly linked to the expansion of the Chinese empire’s geographical and cultural horizons. In addition, they were associated with various aristocratic entertainments, such as polo, hunting and jousting, and they were particularly prized at court, where huge, splendid stables were maintained. The imperial stables were home to 40,000 horses when Han Gan was summoned to work there. The best artists were invited to do portraits of the emperor’s favourite mounts, especially as a large number of these horses were sent to the capital as tribute by the distant regions of Ferghana and Khotan, and the paintings also immortalised the tribute paid by foreign nations to the Chinese court. As such, they take on a historical dimension....

Chinese, 10th century, male.

Active during the second half of the 10th century.

Born in Jurong (Jiangsu).

Painter. Figures, animals.

Hao Cheng painted Buddhist figures, Taoist figures and horses.

Boston (MFA): Man Trying to Capture a Horse (with the inscription ‘From the brush of Hao Cheng’, in the style of the Song Emperor Huizong, sheet of an album dated ...

Chinese, 11th century, male.

Active 1087-1093.

Born in Zheijiang Province.

Painter. Flowers.

Hua Guangren was a Buddhist monk who painted plum trees in blossom.

Chinese, 10th century, male.

Born c. 900, in Chengdu (Sichuan); died 965.

Painter. Religious subjects, flowers, birds.

Huang Quan was a painter in the service of Meng Cheng of the Later Shu kingdom. He painted religious subjects, both Buddhist and Taoist, but mainly flowers and birds, and it was as a flower and bird painter that he was highly appreciated at the Shu court academy. These paintings are very realistic in their detail and imbued with an intense vitality, thanks to a new technique, the so-called ...

Japanese, 11th century, male.

Died 1108.

Sculptor.

Injo, a Buddhist sculptor, is said to be the son of Kakujo or Chosei and the grandson of Jocho, a great sculptor who died in 1057. He was therefore part of an important line of artists who formed one of the two main currents of Buddhist art at the beginning of the Heian period. He is considered the founder of the Shichijo Omiya studio in Kyoto, where he continued to work, with his numerous assistants, in the style of Jocho. It was probably for this reason that he received the honorary title of ...

Japanese, 13th century, male.

Active at the end of the 13th century.

Sculptor.

Injo was a Buddhist sculptor who received the title of Hoin (an ecclesiastical title conferred on sculptors). In 1295, he executed the Jizo Bosatsu (Sanskrit: Bodhisattva Ksitigarbha) of the Umegahata cemetery in Kyoto....

Japanese, 12th century, male.

Active during the first half of the 12th century.

Sculptor.

Inkaku, a Buddhist artist in the line of Jocho who died in 1057, worked in the Shichijo Omiya studio, founded in Kyoto by Injo, who died in 1108. He is said to be the sculptor of the statue of the Amida Buddha (Sanskrit: Amithaba Buddha) in the Hokongo-in monastery in Kyoto, dated ...

Japanese, 13th century, male.

Active at the beginning of the 13th century.

Sculptor.

Inken, the son of Incho, was a Buddhist sculptor at the beginning of the Kamakura period. He was a member of the In School, founded by the sculptor Inson in Kyoto. In the twelfth month of ...

Japanese, 13th century, male.

Active during the second half of the 13th century.

Sculptor.

Inno was a Buddhist sculptor and holder of the title of Hokkyo (‘bridge of the law’, an ecclesiastical title conferred on sculptors). On the first day of the eleventh month of ...