A Brown Bodhidharma

A while back, whilst wandering through the lovely halls of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, I came across a most unusual piece of art. It was a ceramic statue of Bodhidharma, the legendary master who transmitted the Dhyana (Ch'an/Zen) school from India to China.

Bodhidharma is usually depicted as a stern-looking fellow with a big beard and bulging eyes. He's a very popular subject in East Asian Buddhist art, especially in the Ch'an tradition.

I'd seen many depictions of Bodhidharma before, but there was something striking about this particular statue in front of me. Not only was Bodhidharma wearing a green cloak, but this statue (from the Ming Dynasty) showed him with prominently brown skin...a truly Indian Bodhidharma!



One could easily mistake the original Master of Zen for a meditating Sufi!

This also reminded me of another piece of "culturally mixed up art", a modern Indian Guan Yin painting from Exotic India Art.




I wonder how long it'll be before we see African American Earth Store Bodhisattvas, Hispanic Manjushris, and Avalokiteshvaras with blond hair and green eyes.