Chōmeiji Temple Pilgrimage Mandala

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This painting captures the activities of a spring day at Chōmeiji Temple, situated on a hill overlooking Lake Biwa, just east of Kyoto. A wealth of details relates the activities of the temple monks and visitors, who visited the temple to make offerings to the central object of worship, an eleven-headed Kannon, the bodhisattva of compassion. Pilgrimage mandalas (sankei mandara) like this one relate the miraculous stories and seasonal activities of famous temples or shrines. Itinerant preachers used them in a form of storytelling known as etoki, or “picture-narration.” This example was no doubt employed to help raise funds for the rebuilding of the Chōmeiji Temple complex after it was razed by fire in 1516.

Asian Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art