Five Hundred Arhats No.168 · The Venerable Ocean-Jewel | Traditional Hand-Painted Chinese Ink Zen Buddhist Figure Painting | 100×50cm

Five Hundred Arhats · No.168 The Venerable Ocean-Jewel

'Ocean-jewel' says merit is like a treasure, vast without shore, gems of merit and wisdom heaped like a sea whose edge none can find; the name marks one whose jewel-store of virtue is beyond measure. The venerable has a far-reaching look and an oceanic air, possessing the depth of merit like a shoreless jewel-sea, holding every virtue and benefiting beings without exhaustion.

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