Zen in the Art of Painting

by Helmut Brinker

* from USA. Will take 25-35 days

176 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Helmut Brinker is Emeritus Professor of East Asian Art at the University of Zurich.

Reviews

[francisco rivera · Rating 2 out of 5]

i'm not going to lie this book was so boring and it made it really hard to get through. it's definitely an academic type book so i can't really fault the writing for that, that's just the experience i had with the book. i was expecting more on zen buddhist principles and art, and less historical discussion. there was a few cool things in there, i guess i just would have liked it to be more understandable without knowing all the ins and outs of the history and names of people and stuff.

[Michael Anderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting book on the influences of zen buddhism on painting. Too much history and not enough technique, though. Zen influenced paintings are simple, spontaneous, and natural. Subject matter for zen influenced paintings include portraits of zen priests, patriarchs, and pesonalities, nature studies of birds, bamboo, and blossoms, landscapes and dynamic scenes of koans and legends. Zen paintings are typically black and white, made with a variety of brush strokes. That's it. Maybe I expected more. Overall, the book is readable, but it could have been written as a 20 page article in some art magazine.