Jake Sensei has agreed to respond to selected Posts that I have written. Since he is extremely busy with administrative and teaching duties and with family matters, not to mention his own art practice, we have agreed follow the procedure described below as a means of getting his responses in print. We meet after he reads a particular post that I have written and I take notes on or record his comments. I attempt to paraphrase what I heard him say and send him a written version of his comments. He edits, revises or adds to this version, and sends it back to me to publish on the blog-site. Below are Jake Sensei’s comments on the two posts having to do with “Blogging as Performance Art” (PART 1, PART 2. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m starting to feel rather like the fellow in the accompanying image, which is not me, by the way. He looks naked and self-confident; the kind of self confidence that comes from being oblivious to how he really appears to others. Two posts ago (Blogging as Performance Art?) I tried to make the case that there are some close parallels between some types of performance art and the process of moving along various spiritual paths. Based on this, I have started to see my blogging activity as moving my actions as a Zen student even closer to performance art. Here’s how I came to make the connection. Read the rest of this entry »

Zen Master John Loori has created an exercise that allows artists to find out how their work is affecting their viewer’s gut-level responses. I thought it might be fun to try this on-line with the idea that in the future readers could submit their work and get some feedback about the feelings and emotions evoked by their art. Ideally, this exercise is done in a group with a leader guiding participants in a meditative relaxation period before each image is viewed. However, I think you can get an idea of how the process works by following the modified instructions given here.

Once you click on the thumbnail image above, just try to notice the bodily sensations and emotions that are triggered when first looking at the picture. Try to notice these before you starting thinking, interpreting and evaluating the image. To participate in this exercise, click on “Read more about this topic”: and then scroll down to the “LEAVE A REPLY” box at the end of the article. Please enter your observations, which will be kept anonymous. You can also read the comments of others who have participated (please write your comments first). I will write a follow up post based on these comments in the future. Those interested in learning more about Loori’s exercise, can read the rest of this article. Read the rest of this entry »

NO TOUCHING

In 1983-84 Tehching Hsieh and Linda Montano, two artists who did not know each other spent a year bound together by a 8 ft. rope. Among the various conditions they set up for this art piece was the rule that they could not touch one another. What does this have to do with this blog? Well, in mind my it does. So read on and see if you agree.

If you’ve read my ABOUT page, you know that this site is the outgrowth of my Zen studies with my teacher John Jiyu Gage Sensei, (hereafter Jake Sensei). Although intrigued and excited about this project, I also have all sorts of concerns such as: do I have sufficient understanding of the topics covered ? will the eye strain I experience when working on the computer get in the way? will I spend all my time sitting in Zazen planning my next post? will this project take away time from painting? what if I spend hours working on posts and no one reads them? Furthermore, blogging is about expressing ones opinions, yet there are countless admonitions in the Zen literature about being opinionated. Blogging has an element of self promotion about it and this seems at odds with the Zen Way. So forth and so on. Yet, within the Zen tradition, students are expected to respect their teacher’s instructions and mine is encouraging me to take on this enterprise. I could go on and on about the reasons that come up on why I should not do this blog but I best get on with it.

In his book, “Trust the Process”, Shaun McNiff says: “As soon as I approach the unattractive task as a work of art everything changes. So this is what I will try to do with this blog; try to see it as performance art. Read the rest of this entry »