Tag: zen

Z is for Zen, Zoge

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Zen, 禅, Buddhism
Zoge, 象牙, Ivory

Celebrating the last day of this challenge with a two-for-one. Zen, the Japanese school of Mahayana Buddhism emphasising the value of meditation and intuition, and Zoge, the Japanese word for Ivory.

Rather than dump more info on you, I thought I would just let this statue speak for itself. There’s a grounded beauty in its simplicity I could never hope to explain properly. This ivory Buddha belonged to my grandmother. Both my father and I grew up playing with it. The texture on his head is incredibly soothing, and I have strong tactile memories of running my fingers over it whenever I was allowed to take it off the shelf where it was displayed.

Please note, I absolutely don’t condone the sale, trade, or collection of ivory. This piece is from a time when people had different mentalities and knowledge about this sort of thing. It’s treasured by our family and we appreciate it for what it is, and have no intention of ever letting it go back on the market.

Zen Garden Miniature Diorama

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First off, please let me apologise for the lack of updates recently. The weather is still miserably hot, and it’s killing both my ability and my motivation to do much of anything. Work has also been busier than usual. I may not have found the time to change the mannequin lately, but I did want to share this little miniature project I completed recently.

The more I make dioramas and miniature-scale things, the more I realise how much I love it. The Japanese-themed dollhouse was such a pleasure to make that I wanted to do something else with a similar influence. These gorgeous glass and metal terrariums I found at the craft store seemed like an excellent place to start.

I laid in a base of rocks and fine sand to serve as a neutral foundation for everything. The tree was made from scratch, I started with a wire armature, covered it in tape, then covered the whole thing in textured clay. I painted that in shades of brown to mimic bark and then glued on clusters of foliage to give the whole thing a windswept bonsai look. The little pond is resin, with a base of blue glass beads, stones, and tiny shells.

The Buddha is antique ivory. It was my grandmother’s, and my father used it as a teething soother when he was a baby. Eventually I will find a suitable replacement that’s a little smaller and holds a lot less sentimental value, and possibly a tiny stone lantern, but for now I think he looks rather at home there. Looking at the whole thing relaxes and grounds me, and I couldn’t be happier.