Bamboo in the Wind

Bamboo, celebrated in literati culture for its resilience, has been extolled as the embodiment of unyielding moral integrity. Here, a silhouette of bamboo in a storm is executed in ink with calligraphic authority. Rain and wind are never depicted, yet their force is fully felt through branches and leaves rendered in swift, sweeping brushstrokes cascading diagonally downward. The segments and nodes are outlined in confident strokes with hihaku ("flying-white"), affirming the painter’s command of the brush.

The painter Dapeng Zhengkun (Japanese: Taihō Shōkon) was a Chinese monk who came to Japan and served twice as abbot of Manpukuji in Uji, a Zen monastery that stood as a center of Chinese culture during a time of shogunal isolationist policies. Besides his role as a Zen master, Dapeng was renowned for his bamboo paintings in a calligraphic manner that demanded both spontaneity and precision. He actively engaged with artists active around Kyoto. For a more complex ink-bamboo composition by the monk-painter, see 1975.268.80a.