READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

INDEFINITE MOVEMENT 不定動態

Posted April 11, 2020

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Mokurai

05.11.12

________________________________________

CHIBA GARDEN – NORTH VANCOUVER – SPRING 2012. (Photo: M. Cynog-Evans).

■

In the realm of True Purity, there is no such thing as self or other.

– Muso Soseki (1351)

________________________________________

________________________________________

” … ‘Nonlocality’…”.  (Image: M. Cynog Evans.)

●

Any one instance of an existence involves the notion of other existences, connected with it and yet beyond it.

— Alfred North Whitehead (1938)

________________________________________

________________________________________

Ryokan (d. 1831):

The wind has settled, the blossoms have fallen;

Birds sing, the mountains grow dark —

This is the wondrous power of Buddhism.

●

Tozan Ryokai (d. 869):

The teaching of SUCHNESS has

been intimately communicated

by buddhas and ancestors. …

Filling a silver bowl with snow,

hiding a heron in the moonlight —

Taken as similar they’re not the same;

when you mix them, you know where they are.

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Lydia Smith, NEWSWEEK, 8 April 2020:

The moon’s water, ice and other mineral resources can be mined and used by the U.S., according to a new executive order signed by President Donald Trump.

On Monday [6 April], Trump signed the executive order called the Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space Resources. The directive states that the 1967 Outer Space Treaty allows for the use of space resources on the moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

________________________________________

Experimenting …

I hang the moon on various

Branches of the pine

— Hokushi (1667-1718)

________________________________________

________________________________________

READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

INDEFINITE MOVEMENT 不定動態

Posted April 5, 2020

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Curatorial Record:

Right hand: Abhaya mudra (affording protection).

Left hand: Varada mudra (granting a wish).

________________________________________

Standing Buddha — gilded bronze (alternate view) – China, 536 CE. University Museum, Philadelphia.

●

Few among humans are those folk

Who cross to the other shore:

These other people

Just run along the bank.

— Gautama Buddha (d. circa 410 – circa 370 BCE)

________________________________________

It is quite true what Philosophy says: that life must be understood backwards. But that makes one forget that other saying: that it must be lived – forwards.

— Søren Kierkegaard (1843)

________________________________________

ILLUSORY LANDSCAPE – DIGITAL ORIGINAL. (Image: M. Cynog Evans.)

●

POEM ON AN ARTIFICIAL MOUNTAIN

Muso Soseki

(d. 1351 CE)

Without a speck of dust

a high peak rises

Without a drop of water

a loud waterfall plunges.

On one or two evenings

the wind and the full moon

have enabled the right person

to create and play with the scene.

________________________________________

Wallace Stevens (1951):

The imagination is the liberty of the mind. The romantic is a failure to make use of that liberty. It is to the imagination what sentimentality is to feeling. It is a failure of the imagination precisely as sentimentality is a failure of feeling. The imagination is the only genius. It is intrepid and eager and the extreme of its achievement lies in abstraction.

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

The mind and the word are equally being-time. Their reaching and not-reaching alike are being-time. Even when the time of their reaching is not yet over, the time of their not-reaching is come.

– Eihei Dogen (1240)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

GONE AND GOING

Who and when (by more
than otherwise) has done
this/that without the sense
of being even still farther
back than merely back and
and forth but not near?

Where and then again why
should still further on produce
less than before furthermore?
And is here and there either
more than before or less than
ever again the gain and loss
of a merely proposed becoming
become (of a sudden) present?

Mokurai

06.11.18

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

KAMAKURA DAIBUTSU/THE GREAT BUDDHA OF KAMAKURA (cast in 1252 CE) – photographed on 2 April 2020.

________________________________________

________________________________________

READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

INDEFINITE MOVEMENT 不定動態

Posted March 28, 2020

Edward T. Hall (1976):

There are two related crises in today’s world. The first and most visible is the population/environment crisis. The second, more subtle but equally lethal, is humankind’s relationships to its extensions, institutions, ideas, as well as the relationships among the many individuals and groups that inhabit the globe.

If both crises are not resolved, neither will be. Despite our faith in technology and our reliance on technical solutions, there are NO technical solutions to most of the problems confronting human beings. Furthermore, even those technical solutions that can be applied to environmental problems can’t be applied rationally until mankind transcends the intellectual limitations imposed by our institutions, our philosophies, and our cultures. Compounding all of this is the reality of politics.

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

” … ‘Dislocation’…”. Image: M. Cynog Evans, 2020.

________________________________________

________________________________________

INVISIBLY CLEAR

    Absurdity challenges every ethics.

    – Simone de Beauvoir

We (always) have seen (awful) scenes

before they became a becoming

similar to a reason for (still) existing.

Repeat (revolve … contrarily):

All scenes seen can seem (again)

infinitely similar to every other ruined

future seeking (full) finite fulfillment.

Mokurai

23.03.20

________________________________________

Alfred Caldwell (1976):

The world is like a dream in which all the tragedies of mankind are in reality only the illusions of nightmares. For man himself makes every possibility, and also every collapse. To repeat: man even makes nature, the idea of the Universe, the idea of time and space. And man makes hope. There is hope to the last charge. There is hope in the 59th minute of the 11th hour. There is no hope in the stars – not one electron is worth. There is only hope in the SOUL of man. There is hope, delicate hoofed, to stand against eternity, stare down the sun, and leap from crag to crag, and so go past imploring chaos.

________________________________________

Shao Yung (1011-1077):

The numbers of Heaven are five (1, 3, 5, 7, 9,). The numbers of Earth are also five (2, 4, 6, 8, 10). Together they form the ten numbers in all. Heaven differentiates from 1 (Great Ultimate) to 4 (the Four Forms of greater and lesser yin and yang). Earth also differentiates from 1 to 4 (the Four Forms of greater and lesser strength and weakness). The four are physical, but the one is not. This is the ultimate distinction of being and non-being. The substance of Heaven numbers 4 (Four Forms), but its function numbers only 3 (minus greater yin). The same is true of Earth (minus greater strength).

●

Natalie Wolchover, QUANTA MAGAZINE:

A provocative paper published in the journal NATURE ASTRONOMY [4 November 2019] argues that the universe may curve around and close in on itself like a sphere, rather than lying flat like a sheet of paper as the standard theory of cosmology predicts.

The data in question – the Planck space telescope’s observations of ancient light called the cosmic microwave background (CMB) – “clearly points towards a closed model,” said Alessandro Melchiori of Sapienza University of Rome. He co-authored the new paper with Eleonora di Valentino of the University of Manchester and Joseph Silk, principally of the University of Oxford. In their view, discordance between CMB data, which suggests the universe is closed, and other data pointing to flatness represents a “cosmological crisis” that calls for “drastic rethinking.”

________________________________________

________________________________________

Shao Yung (1011-1077):

Without sincerity, one cannot investigate principle to the utmost.

Sincerity is the controlling factor in one’s nature. It is beyond space and time.

________________________________________

READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

WAY IN/往裡之道

Posted March 20, 2020

_______________________________

_______________________________

” … ‘Way In’…”. Image: M. Cynog Evans, 2020.

_______________________________

Knowledge must wait for something before it can be applicable, and that which it waits for is never certain.

– Chuang Tzu (369? – 286? BCE)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Plato (d. 347 BCE):

No matter how hard you fight the darkness, every light casts a shadow, and the closer you get to the light, the darker that shadow becomes.

________________________________________

________________________________________

READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

SENSORY MODES 感官模式

Posted March 13, 2020

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Human reality is a perpetual surpassing toward a coincidence with itself which is never given.

— Jean-Paul Sartre (1943)

________________________________________

________________________________________

” … ‘Gathered’…”. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

________________________________________

________________________________________

‘TREE OF LIFE’ — South India (Tamil Nadu or the Deccan), 16th-17th century. Bronze. 24 x 23 inches (60.96 x 58.42 cm). The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City.

Curatorial Record:

This sculpture may represent the Tree of Life, or a specific tree from (ancient) India. This tree holds 14 geese in its branches. At the top of its stem, a rearing five-headed NAGA (cobra) sits above a lotus flower. A pair of monkeys clings to the tree trunk and two cows rest at its base. The animal imagery may relate to the Hindu cowherd god Krishna (who is frequently depicted in a grove beneath a flowering tree).

This enigmatic work may have served as the back of an altar featuring a sculpture of Krishna.

_______________________________________

Gilles Deleuze (1972):

The death of a social machine has never been heralded by a disharmony or a dysfunction; on the contrary, social machines make a habit of feeding on the contradictions they rise to, on the crises they provoke, on the anxieties they engender, and on the infernal operations that they regenerate.

●

Indeed, without death there would hardly have been any philosophizing.

— Luce Irigaray (1997)

________________________________________

________________________________________

” … ‘Wheel(s) of Time’…”.  Image: M. Cynog Evans.

________________________________________

________________________________________

Awareness is the place of the deathless; unawareness is the place of death. The aware do not die; the unaware are as though dead already.

– Gautama Buddha (DHAMMAPADA)

________________________________________

________________________________________

Eihei Dogen (1200-1253):

If we inquire into the manner and style of the totality of phenomena, we should bear in mind there are many worlds everywhere.

________________________________________

Walk during a few moments very consciously in a certain direction; simultaneously an infinite number of living creatures in the universe are moving in an infinite number of directions.

– stanley brouwn (1969)

________________________________________

________________________________________

READING (EAST/WEST) 閱讀 （東/西）

SENSORY MODES 感官模式

Posted March 6, 2020

________________________________________

Vase (porcelain with ox-blood glaze). China – late 17th – early 18th century.

H. 10 in. (25.4 cm). Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

●

Both utopia and dystopia are often an enclave of maximum control surrounded by a wilderness.

– Ursula K. Le Guin (2016)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

The beginning and ending of all things are nothing but integration and disintegration.

— Ch’eng I (1033-1107)

________________________________________

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 5. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

●

Try to find a scientific definition of life and you won’t find one. Life IS sacred.

– Botanist/medical biochemist Diana Beresford-Kroeger (2019)

________________________________________

Man and things will die out, and then there will be a new beginning.

— Chu Hsi (1130-1200)

________________________________________

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 6. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

●

A flame of the world of truth is self-illuminating.

— Kukai (d. 835 CE)

________________________________________

________________________________________

Our actual world is a universal operation.

– Fung Yu-lan (1895-1990)

●

We are long sleeping visitors in the darkroom of basic ignorance.

– Kukai (d. 835 CE)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

SENSORY MODES 感官模式

Posted February 28, 2020

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 1. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 2. Image: M. Cynog Evans.

●

By effort, awareness,

Restraint and self-control,

The wise one should make an island

Which the flood will not overwhelm.

— Gautama Buddha (d. circa 410 – circa 370 BCE)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 3. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

●

Confucius (d. 479 BCE):

I once spent a whole day without food and a whole night without sleep, in order to meditate. It was no use. It is better to learn.

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Plato (c. 375 BCE):

Anyone who has common sense will remember that the bewilderment of the eyes is of two kinds, either from coming out of the light or from going into the light.

________________________________________

________________________________________

DIGITAL (ORIGINAL) – 4. Image: M. Cynog-Evans.

●

SINGING IMAGE OF A WHIRLING RING OF FIRE

Kukai

(d. 835 CE)

Whirling fire becomes a square and a circle as the hand moves.

Many changes are made according to our will.

One eternal word, “Ah!” turns into many others

Expressing innumerable Buddha-truths.

________________________________________

________________________________________

Posted February 14, 2020

●  Philip Ivanhoe (Distinguished Chair Professor of Philosophy in the College of Confucian Studies and Eastern Philosophy at Sungkyunkwan University, South Korea), 17 January, 2020:

While conceived of and functioning differently in diverse contexts, ‘face’ describes a phenomenon that exists in every human society. It’s most basic sense concerns the public presentation and perception of the self. Someone who has face possesses something of positive social value that arises from social approval of a person’s status, action or state of being; someone who loses face has suffered a loss in social value concerning her status, behaviour or state of being. In addition to public perception, ‘face’ has an internal psychological aspect as well: it captures one’s self-image and evaluation of oneself in regard to shared ethical standards and social hierarchies, expectations and norms.

Face is particularly important in East Asian societies such as China, and found in two related forms. The first and more popular conception, MIANZI, primarily concerns wealth, social status, position, power and prestige; the second, LIAN, concerns moral character and behaviour. A person can have MIANZI – eg. status, position, etc – but lack a corresponding level of LIAN – eg, be regarded as morally bad. A complete lack of LIAN erodes and eventually undermines one’s MIANZI, while someone with great LIAN will have considerable MIANZI.

In contemporary Chinese society, the question of face has taken a new and disturbing form that profoundly affects these more traditional, Confucian inspired conceptions. China’s rapidly expanding network of surveillance cameras increasingly relies upon AI-aided facial-recognition technology to achieve much of its primary mission: to keep track of, record, control and modify the behaviour of its citizens.

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Taipei, Taiwan

REUTERS

February 9, 2020

(Updated February 10, 2020)

Taiwan’s air force scrambled armed fighters on Sunday [9 February] to intercept Chinese jets that flew around the island claimed by Beijing as it’s own, in a move denounced by Taiwan’s Defence Ministry as a threat to regional peace and stability.

China has been flying what it calls “island encirclement” drills on-off since 2016 when Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen first took office. Beijing believes Tsai, who won re-election last month, wishes to push the island’s formal independence.

Tsai says Taiwan is an independent country called the Republic of China, its official name.

…

China’s Eastern Theatre Command, in a statement late on Sunday carried by the official People’s Liberation Army Daily, said the aircraft carried out “real combat-oriented training”.

“Taiwan and its island are sacred and inalienable parts of China,” according to the statement.

________________________________________

________________________________________

” … (IN)VISIBLE …”.  Photo: M. Cynog Evans, 2020.

●

“There is nothing to be seen beyond our horizons, but other landscapes and still other horizons, and nothing inside the thing but other smaller things.”

– Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1945)

________________________________________

________________________________________

bill bissett, INSIDE DISOLVING OPNING – acrylic on canvas – 2020. (Collection: Dr. Joy Masuhara.)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

LUNAR NEW YEAR LANTERN FESTIVAL 2020 農曆元宵節

Posted February 7, 2020

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Note:

The Great Buddha (Daibutsu) of Kamakura is a representation of Amida (one of the Five Wisdom Buddhas). Located on the grounds of Kotoku-in temple, Kamakura City, the monument dates to 1252 CE. As the second largest ‘substitute image’ of Amida Buddha in Japan, it reaches a height of 13.5 meters.

●

Eihei Dogen (d.1253 CE):

To start from the self and try to understand all things is delusion. To let the self be awakened by all things is enlightenment.

●

“The cleverer I am at miniaturizing the world, the better I possess it.”

– Gaston Bachelard (1957)

________________________________________

Utagawa Hiroshige, MOON VIEWING POINT, 1857. Polychrome woodblock print – ink and colour on paper. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

________________________________________

________________________________________

WING SHOWS ON STARWAY ZODIAC CAROUSEL

Mina Loy

(1923)

Cyclones

of ecstatic dust

and ashes whirl

crusaders

from hallucinatory citadels

of shattered glass

into evacuate craters

A flock of dreams

browse on Necropolis

From the shores

of oval oceans

in the Orient

Onyx-eyed Odalisques

and ornithologists

observe the flight

of Eros obsolete

And “Immortality”

mildews

in the museums of the moon

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

LUNAR NEW YEAR  農曆初七 (2020)

Posted January 31, 2020

________________________________________

To follow the principles of the world without altering them and to attain one’s end is virtue.

—  Yang Hsiung (53 BCE – 18 CE)

________________________________________

________________________________________

Chou Tun-i (1017-1073):

Things cannot be tranquil when active or active while tranquil. Spirit, however, can be active without activity and tranquil without tranquility.

________________________________________

________________________________________

MARSHAL WANG (Guardian Deity of Daoism). Hanging scroll –ink and colour on silk– dated 1542. Unidentified artist (China). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Curatorial Record:

Marshal Wang –one of the fierce guardian deities of Daoism– is charged with protecting Daoist temples. (Wang was originally a human; he was posthumously deified and revered as a god.) Here, he rides a flaming wheel, vanquishing the evil serpent spirits in the river below.

________________________________________

” … ‘Deep and Dark Abode’ …”. (Photo: M. Cynog Evans, 2020.)

[ Note:

This image records a CHINESE (MEDICINAL) WINE BOTTLE (produced and distributed to Canada by the Wing Lee Wai Company, c. 1930). The embossing reads: “Federal Law Forbids Sale or Re-Use of This Bottle … Wing Lee Wai, Macao”.

— CAUSA Research Curators ]

●

Spirit does not leave physical form but is not restricted by it.

— Chu Hsi (1130-1200)

________________________________________

________________________________________

________________________________________

Bill Bissett, A PISCEAN MOON … ‘acrylik on canvas –painted Januaree 2020’.

________________________________________

Zen monk Fugai Ekun, HOTEI POINTING AT THE MOON, 1650. Hanging scroll –ink on paper. The Metropilitan Museum of Art, New York.

Curatorial Record:

The portly monk Hotei is shown hoisting his sack over his shoulder while he points a finger at the sky above, toward an unseen moon.

[ The inscription reads:

Throughout my life,

I haven’t been poor

nor have lived

amid wealth.

Pointing at the moon,

looking at the moon,

I’m just an old traveler

along the way. ]

________________________________________

________________________________________

Nature is a haunted house –but Art– a House that tries to be haunted.

— Emily Dickinson (1876)

________________________________________

Embody to the fullest what has no end and wander where there is no trail.

— Chuang Tzu (369? – 286? BCE)

________________________________________

________________________________________