Five Hundred Arhats No.421 · The Venerable Flowers Offered in Absorption | Traditional Hand-Painted Chinese Ink Zen Buddhist Figure Painting | 100×50cm

Five Hundred Arhats · No.421 The Venerable Flowers Offered in Absorption

The name "Dinghuazhi" is recorded in the Southern Song Arhat-Name Stele; it means offering that arises from samādhi, bringing flowers to the Buddha — within absorption making flower-offering with a pure heart to adorn the Buddha-way. The name marks one whose offering arises from absorption, adorning with blossoms. The venerable bears a meditative look of stillness, possessing offering born of absorption, flower-adorning, balanced absorption and wisdom, and pure offering dedicated to bodhi.

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