Iridescent halo shimmering behind him, the lama Buton Rinchen Drub smiles out from deep empty darkness. In the fourteenth century, Buton organized the Buddhist canon into scripture and commentary, called respectively Kanjur and Tenjur. He also established guidelines for creating mandalas that inform the tradition to this day. Buton was an inclusive thinker who drew ideas from many meditative and artistic traditions. Lamas from across the spectrum of Tibetan Buddhist orders are arrayed along each side of his throne, each one playing a part in Buton’s teaching system. This painting is stylistically inclusive, incorporating elements of Tibetan and Chinese traditions in fine balance.

On the reverse of the thangka, Buton’s ghostly shadow hovers between two golden handprints. These anonymous hands likely penned the veritable Rosetta stone of Buddhist sacred script that appears below them; here, the standard Buddhist consecration phrase appears in four different forms. It reads “the Buddha has explained the cause of all things that arise from a cause. He, the Great Monk, has also explained their cessation.” This phrase transforms the object on which it is inscribed into a virtual stupa, thus simultaneously preserving and transmitting the power it contains. The calligraphy of the anonymous lama appears in four different scripts: the formal Lantsa, the flowing Siddham, standard Tibetan Uchan (“with heads”) script, and cursive Tibetan Umey (“without heads”) script.

The four seasons are one of the most enduring themes in Japanese painting and decorative art. This pair of screens (with B60D49+) depicts seasonal changes proceeding from right to left across a composition with waters and an island in the center anchored by rocky cliffs on either side.

In the right screen (shown here), spring is represented by figures emerging on a path from pavilions nestled in steep mountains amid flowering trees; summer is indicated through people boating and engaged in outdoor activities on a vast body of water. In the left screen (B60D49+), autumn is suggested by a scholar and his assistant heading into their hermitage on the expansive, boat-dotted water, while winter is represented by a pair of hermits retreating to a white-roofed pavilion beneath towering snow-covered mountains. The gold applied across the surface of both screens is thought to have been added in a later period.

Shikibu Terutada is considered one of the most important ink painters of the Muromachi period, yet at the same time he is one of the least known because he seems to have worked in the Kanto region of Eastern Japan, far from the cultural center of Kyoto. He was apparently a traveling, professional painter who produced works for temples and for powerful samurai of that region. Scholars suggest that he may have learned his complex brushstrokes and compositions from Kenko Shokei (active approx. 1478-1506) and perhaps from the Kanto branch of the Kano school. This work is one of Shikibu’s best known and is frequently sought for exhibitions and publications.

Vajrapani, deep blue and grasping a stylized thunderbolt, emerges from emptiness on a glowing disk of light. In Tibet, Vajrapani is called a yidam: a special kind of deity-image built up in the mind’s eye during meditation. By precisely envisioning the body of Vajrapani, meditators learn an important Buddhist lesson: how mental images shape our experience of being in a body.

The back of this painting reveals how Tibetan religious teachers called “lamas” projected Vajrapani into a picture such as this. First, they visualized the deity entering the painted image. Then they inscribed the syllables om ah hum on its reverse, at the deity’s brow, throat, and heart. Together, these three syllables represent the Body-Speech-Mind of Vajrapani and serve to seal the artistic creation and the deity together. This procedure transforms an ordinary, material picture of Vajrapani into the deity’s virtual body.

This two-panel screen is a study in contrasts. The complex composition in lacquer on paper, at the right, contrasts with a single bat floating on a sea of gold on the left. Two young brown deer stand opposite a grizzled old white deer, which in turn is set against the darkness of a rocky outcropping with brown mushrooms sprouting below. The animal and plant motifs in this painting are unusually rich in auspicious meanings. The character used to write the word “bat” sounds like a word for good fortune and blessings when pronounced in Chinese, and the character for “deer” sounds like another character meaning prosperity and rewards. A white deer is the companion of Fukurokuju, one of the Seven Lucky Gods; the mushrooms beside the deer’s feet are associated with immortality. Finally, the combination of deer and bats recalls the phrase, “May your blessings and rewards be complete.”

This screen depicts a well-known Chinese poet in a landscape setting. The Song dynasty poet Lin Hejing and his young servant watch a crane—their pet—in flight. Gentle hills, pine trees, and bamboo surround the poet’s modest dwellings. The representation in art of an ideal life of seclusion became popular in the Muromachi period (1392–1573), when, influenced by the tastes of Zen Buddhist temples, the warrior class began to appreciate the muted expressiveness of delicate ink paintings. While the samurai enjoyed lavish, glittering golden screens in their courts and castles, some of their screens and doors represented literary themes, executed in ink monochrome.

The accompanying screen (B60D74+) features another Chinese poet, Tao Yuanming, enjoying a drink while lost in the contemplation of an expansive mountain landscape.

In 1543, three Portuguese travelers aboard a Chinese ship drifted ashore on Tanegashima, a small island near Kyushu. They were the first Europeans to visit Japan. In 1548, Francis Xavier, a Jesuit, arrived from Goa to introduce Christianity to the Japanese. Thereafter a stream of Portuguese traders and Jesuit missionaries came to Japan. The Japanese called them nanban (southern barbarians) because they sailed to Japan from the south. Portuguese merchants brought tin, lead, gold, silk, and wool and cotton textiles, among other goods, to Japan, which exported swords, lacquer ware, silk, and silver.

The Japanese were fascinated by the Portuguese because of their ships, exotic appearance, costumes, language, and merchandise. They depicted these foreigners in great detail in paintings and screens. This work portrays the arrival of a Portuguese ship at the port of Nagasaki. On the left (shown here) are the captain and his crew, who have just landed; some cargo is still being unloaded. On the right (B60D78+), they are proceeding to a Christian church. At its entrance, Jesuit priests welcome the party. Some Japanese townsfolk are observing them curiously.

Dressed in a kimono decorated with a calligraphy pattern, this voluptuous courtesan lifts the front of her robe and lightly touches her neck as she looks back over one shoulder. Her posture creates an S curve, which was considered feminine and is commonly seen in paintings of beautiful women. Loosely tied at the front, her light brown sash (obi) trails behind, suggesting the stately forward movement of a courtesan on parade.

The artist, Baiyuken Katsunobu, frequently used flowing Chinese characters to decorate the garments of his figures. Here they appear in white against a background of various shades of blue. Bold Chinese characters reading “love” and “listen” are superimposed over smaller Japanese characters. Like many courtesan paintings of the time, this one shows its subject against a blank background with no indication of place, occasion, or season.

In his search for the truth, Shakyamuni, the historic Buddha, tried various methods of meditation before he finally achieved enlightenment under the bodhi tree. This piece depicts him during the time when he practiced austerities and starved himself until he was skeletal in appearance. Shakyamuni wears the simple garment of a monk, and his exposed chest reveals his ribs. His eyes are half closed and his face bears a serene expression. Because Shakyamuni is Indian, the Chinese craftworker shows him with a mustache and a ringed beard. The fasting Buddha sits in meditation with one leg bent and one leg raised, resting his chin on his hands above a raised knee.

Shakyamuni’s pose and his facial features were already well established as a standard iconographical feature as early as the Yuan dynasty (1272–1368). Yet large figures such as this example were not made until the Qing dynasty, when the supply of jade became more plentiful.

During the Qing dynasty, pictorial jade mountains were based on paintings. A crane flying above a pavilion wreathed in clouds associates this stone mountain with immortals. Typical of such mountains, there are pine trees and a huai tree with compound leaves, and steps leading to a cave. An immortal holding a basket stands on a rocky ledge above a swirling stream while his youthful attendant plucks lingzhi fungus from the rock. This fungus is associated with immortality as well as wish fulfillment.

Chinese myths are full of tales associated with lingzhi fungus. In the Legend of the White Snake, the heroine had to steal the Fungus of Immortality to bring her husband back to life; and the Immortal Magu was known for her fungus wine, which she prepared for the Queen Mother of the West. The mountain scene includes two deer, an animal believed to be able to find the fungus of immortality. The smooth surface of the cliff to the right of the two figures is incised with a poem composed by the Qianlong emperor for a painting by Qiu Ying titled “Gathering Fungus in the Mountains of the Immortals.” The gold-filled characters contrast with the blue background.

The Buddha sits enthroned beneath the bodhi tree as the demon Mara and his forces attack. One of his soldiers aims a gun at the Buddha; another wears a shirt with magic symbols drawn on it to protect the wearer from harm.