Five Hundred Arhats No.458 · The Venerable Emptiness of Being | Traditional Hand-Painted Chinese Ink Zen Buddhist Figure Painting | 100×50cm

Five Hundred Arhats · No.458 The Venerable Emptiness of Being

'Emptiness of being' means seeing the self-nature of 'being' as originally empty, existing through dependent origination yet empty in itself, being without self-nature, knowing emptiness within being; the name marks one who sees being's nature as empty, unhindered in dependent origination. The venerable makes a dependent-origination contemplation with a harmonious look, possessing the integration of seeing being's emptiness, dependent origination without self-nature, emptiness within being, falling neither into being nor non-being through self-nature-emptiness wisdom.

Painted by Li Zongyi in the freehand Chinese ink (xieyi) tradition, the brushwork is fluent and the ink tones layered from dense to pale, capturing the arhat’s spirit in a few assured strokes. The blank paper itself breathes Zen; figure and spirit are one, blending monastic solemnity with the literati’s ease. Each of the Five Hundred Arhats bears its own name and practice, uniting faith, art and collectibility — an original, non-reproducible hand-painted work.

Size: approx. 100×50cm (4.5 square chi) | Traditional hand-painted Chinese ink Zen Buddhist figure painting | On paper