Fudō Myōō (Achala Vidyaraja), The Immovable Wisdom King

Mokujiki Shōnin

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Statues of the Buddhist protective deity Fudō Myōō, the “immovable wisdom king,” are a familiar sight at temples in Japan. In contrast to meticulously carved works by professionals, this type of roughly hewn sculpture is the creation of an amateur monk-sculptor, Mokujiki, who was motivated by religious enthusiasm to make thousands of sculptures of Buddhist deities and popular gods of good fortune. His sculptures were rediscovered in the early twentieth century by art critic Yanagi Sōetsu (1889–1961), an advocate of the of Mingei, or “people’s art.” Yanagi admired the direct, unaffected power of Mokujiki’s sculpture, which he saw as representing the ideal of an indigenous, popular Japanese art. While Mokujiki’s technique is referred to as natabori (“hatchet-carved”), the artist actually used round-headed chisels.

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