Five Hundred Arhats No.76 · The Venerable Neither Empty Nor Existent | Traditional Hand-Painted Chinese Ink Zen Buddhist Figure Painting | 100×50cm

Five Hundred Arhats · No.76 The Venerable Neither Empty Nor Existent

'Neither empty nor existent' is the right Madhyamaka view: falling neither into nihilistic emptiness nor grasping at the mark of real existence, where emptiness and existence are non-dual and both extremes are left behind. The venerable looks balanced and moves with moderation, showing the harmony of one beyond all four propositions and hundred negations, clear on the middle way of the ultimate truth.

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