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Image Not Available for "One-Stroke" Daruma (after Shokai Reiken)
"One-Stroke" Daruma (after Shokai Reiken)
Image Not Available for "One-Stroke" Daruma (after Shokai Reiken)

"One-Stroke" Daruma (after Shokai Reiken)

Maker
After (Japanese, 1315 - 1396)
Datelate 14th century
MediumHanging scroll, ink on paper
DimensionsPanel: 26 × 11 7/8 in. (66 × 30.2 cm)
Credit LineTransfer from The Hood Museum, Dartmouth College in honor of Robert W. Christy
Object number1997.15
Status
Not on view
Description

This painting is most likely a copy of an original now preserved in the Umezawa Kinenkan, Tokyo. Popularly called Ippitsubyo no Daruma or "One Brushstroke Bodhidharma" the painting is originally thought to have been brushed by Reiken, the 43rd abbot of Tofukuji. The painting is based on the legend that during nine years of meditating in front of a rock face at Shaolinsi on Mt. Song in China, Daruma subjected himself to a several ascetic exercise of meditation much like the historical Buddha. The inscription at the top relates to a poem by Reiken:


My bed is cold when I’m sleeping at night.


Mulberry-paper cassock, paper mosquito curtain


Following the Dharma, acting as circumstance demands


With my hemp-palm chowry, and goosefoot staff.