Cleveland Museum of Art

Weizheng Riding on an Ox

Yamaguchi Sekkei

Date

1687

Medium

hanging scroll; ink on paper

Culture

Japan, Edo period (1615–1868)

Department

Japanese Art

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

The inscription at the top of this painting was brushed by Ōbaku school monk Nanyuan Xingpai (Japanese: Nangen Shōha), a Chinese Buddhist monk who emigrated to Japan in 1654, while the painting was done in ink by Yamaguchi Sekkei, a Japanese painter active in Kyoto who was known for his Buddhist subjects, many of which remain in temples today. The figure here reads a text while riding backward upon a water buffalo. Sekkei's painting depicts the Chinese monk Weizheng (986–1049), also known as "Zheng of the Yellow Ox" after his favored mount. Nanyuan's inscription is a poem about the monk. The Ōbaku lineage of the Zen school of Buddhism in Japan is named for Mount Huangbo (Japanese: Ōbaku) in China.

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