연세대학교 매체와예술연구소

제목 : ‘The Meditation Master Conquers Contemporary Korea: Representations of the First Zen Patriarch in East Asian Art.’

발표자 : Beatrix Mecsi

사 회 : 김혜련(본 연구소 전문연구원)

일 시 : 2007년 7월 31일 화요일 오후 4시

장 소 : 위당관 203호

내 용 :

Anyone who visits Korea soon encounters the representations of a certain Indian-looking old man with glaring eyes, beard and usually serious but at the same time very humorous appearance.
This ugly-looking bearded man is called Bodhidharma and believed to be the founder of meditational (Sŏn, or Chan or its more commonly known Japanese name, Zen) Buddhism, who went to China around the 6th century to propagate Buddhism.
His figure and his legend is usually represented in Buddhist temples, but as a recent phenomenon we can find his figure more and more often in secular and semi-secular context, such as in souvenir shops not only at the vicinity of temples but in other tourist areas and frequently visited places, like resting places near highways, or even in subway stations and in restaurants in South Korea. In popular women magazines and in the television we can often find advertisements for Bodhidharma-painters offering well-being for their customers.

I have spent several years of research with collecting textual and visual references concerning Bodhidharma in East Asian countries, where his figure appeared and venerated.
In my paper I would like to summarize and to draw attention to a current trend in South Korean visual arts and Buddhism when producing and distributing images of the first Zen patriarch is gaining momentum what we cannot ignore and should deal with it in the context of its inner developments and history as well as in context with other Asian countries.