Jizō Bosatsu Playing a Flute

Jizō Bosatsu Playing a Flute

Kano Tan'yū

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This elegant vision of the bodhisattva Jizō Bosatsu (Sanskrit: Ksitigarbha) playing a flute is a rare and innovative portrayal that may have been created by Kano Tan’yū himself, who, as head of the Shogun’s painting academy (edokoro), was familiar with most of the ancient paintings that had survived to his day. The few similar paintings known of a flute-playing Jizō are by Tan’yū or his followers. The gentle, boyish figure, dancing, playing a flute, and wearing both the traditional monk’s robe and the flowing scarves and jewels of a bodhisattva, combines several aspects of Jizō’s traditional iconography. Instead of lotus petals, he wears a huge, overturned lotus leaf upon his head. His monk’s staff and sacred wish-granting jewel have been replaced by a phoenix-headed flute.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Jizō Bosatsu Playing a FluteJizō Bosatsu Playing a FluteJizō Bosatsu Playing a FluteJizō Bosatsu Playing a FluteJizō Bosatsu Playing a Flute

The Met's collection of Asian art—more than 35,000 objects, ranging in date from the third millennium B.C. to the twenty-first century—is one of the largest and most comprehensive in the world. Each of the many civilizations of Asia is represented by outstanding works, providing an unrivaled experience of the artistic traditions of nearly half the world.