Brooklyn Zen Center | A New York City Soto Zen Buddhist Temple
Daily Cloud

“Strange though this may sound, not knowing where one is going, being lost, being a loser, reveals the greatest possible faith and optimism, as against collective security and collective significance. To believe, one must have lost God; to paint, one must have lost art.” -Gerhard Richter If you are a poet, you will see clearly that there is a cloud floating in this sheet of paper. Without a cloud there will be no water; without water, the trees cannot grow; and without trees, you cannot make paper. So the cloud is in here. The existence of this page is dependent upon the existence of a cloud. Paper and cloud are so close. -Thich Nhat Hahn Daily Cloud explores a moment in the practice of two painters: Paul Miyamoto and Karen Dana as they tackle the same subject. Clouds seem to be visible masses of water or frozen crystals suspended over celestial bodies; we perceive them as something more than air and less than object as they loom above our busy lives. Paint seems to be a...

Thunder and Lightening

Creating art can be similar to meditation. Both practices contain feelings of confinement and freedom and a sense of exposure. Stemming from this nakedness, commitments to art and to zazen (sitting) have another deep affinity; here all emotions and all manifestations of oneself are welcome. On zafu (cushion) as on paper, one tries not to turn away from ugliness, beauty, confusion, or fear. Maybe this is why Gertrude Stein famously said “art isn’t everything, it’s just about everything,” and why Teah Strozer, senior teacher at the Brooklyn Zen Center, called the zendo (meditation hall) a place to “be everything.” Maybe this is why so many members of the Brooklyn Zen Center are artists of some kind. “Thunder and Lightening” is an auspicious show because it marks the opening of a new space for the Boundless Mind Temple. 505 Carroll Street is Brooklyn Zen Center’s third location and first non-domestic space. Its larger scale and unique design suggest that this is a place for a...

Sweetcake Enso

 On Saturday, November 20th, the No Eyes Viewing Wall at Brooklyn Zen Center will be hosting a new show, Sweetcake Enso. The show, which originated at the Empty Hand Zen Center in New Rochelle in October, is actually a series of exhibitions that will be traveling to various Zen Centers across the country over the next several months. Brooklyn will be the next stop on this tour. The opening celebration will take place on the evening of the 20th, from 6:00 - 8:00pm (after the one-day sit). Tea and cookies will be served. According to Catherine Seigen Spaeth, the show's organizer, Sweetcake Enso represents "an entirely new conception of art making and exhibition as practice," in which local sangha and international artists respond to the traditional form of the Enso, the iconic Zen "circle" (seen above in a sumi ink drawing by Max Gimblett). Catherine will be co-curating the Brooklyn event with...

Ms. Wallace: Gun Control Pictures

We warmly welcome your attendance this Friday from 6:00-8:00 pm at the opening reception of a new series of paintings by BZC sangha member Ms Wallace. "A show of 10 paintings which allegorize the process of transforming selfish lashing out into disciplined and effective action. This imagery comes from the artist's experience of the chasm between the ideals of her own wisdom and the reality of Zen practice as it is. As a metaphor for the imperfection of the Zen practitioner, the paintings themselves exist as they are."
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

  1. Undisciplined

With his horns fiercely projected in the air the beast snorts,
Madly running over the mountain paths, farther and farther he goes astray! 
A dark cloud is spread across the entrance of the valley,
And who knows how much of the fine fresh herb is trampled under...

Ellen Driscoll & Robert Oxnam: "Washed Up"

April 1-June 9, 2011
Viewing and Discussion: Friday April 1, 2011 5:30-8:00pm
5:30-6:00 Meditation
6:00-7:00 Tea and viewing
7:00-8:00 Discussion
(other viewings by special appointment only)

The No-Eyes Viewing Wall at Brooklyn Zen Center is pleased to present Washed Up, a multi-dimensional collaboration between sculptors Ellen Driscoll and Robert Oxnam. In addition to premiering their installation on the wall, the artists, who have never before worked together, will engage the Brooklyn Zen community in a discussion on states of creative mind. A transcript of the discussion will then become part of the exhibition.

Ellen and Robert are gleaners of found objects, which they transform, magician-like, with intuition, ingenuity and precision. Ellen, who collects her raw material in early morning rambles through Brooklyn, converts plastic water bottles into undulating and intricate nets containing miniature architectural elements. Robert’s...

Claudia Vieira: Double Trace

The No-Eyes Viewing Wall at Brooklyn Zen Center presents a new project by New York-based Brazilian artist Claudia Vieira.  Double Trace will open on Saturday June 11, 2011 and stay up through October 26, 2011.
 
Since 2001, Claudia Vieira has worked with a single drawn line, which may fill paper, wall, or a large space. The line inscribes time; it measures her commitment to drawing; it follows the meta-line of her life.  She marks every environment that she encounters by means of a sustained concentrated effort, and these marks become records of her physical endurance that ultimately hum with optical intensity.  As she says, “It paradoxically blurs assumed boundaries between origin and destination, inside and outside and ultimately, self and other.” Claudia has exhibited this work in many venues, including “Waterline,” a drawing environment at the Queens Museum of Art in 2010.
 
For this exhibition, Claudia has been...

Zen Monster 3 Release

kindly join us for the ZEN MONSTER 3 RELEASE:  november 4, 2011 6-9 pm @ brooklyn zen center 


readings by:

Barbara Henning, Lewis Warsh, Edgar Oliver, Kimberly Lyons, 
Steve Dalachinsky, Yuko Otomo, Robyn Ellenbogen, 
Fred Dewey, Brian Unger, Anselm Berrigan, 
Ammiel Alcalay, Noah Fischer

music by adam bernstein 
amerigo mackeral & the octave doktors

zenmonster.com
brooklynzen.org

...
Silence and Noise

 

The No-Eyes Viewing Wall at Brooklyn Zen Center is proud to present Silence and Noise, a new multidisciplinary project that will open on Friday, April 13th from 7pm to 10pm.

In the Zen Buddhist tradition, each silent meditation period begins and ends with the striking of a bell. The sound waves emanating from the vibrating body of the bell fill the room, envelop the sitters, and slowly pulse to silence. The silence that abides is in fact not silent at all, but filled with the sound of breathing, noisy thoughts, and street traffic outside of the meditation room. From this non-silence, the bell emerges once more. The sound of the bell, as Shunryu Suzuki Roshi notes, is both objective and subjective. Objectively, it is the...

Awake Youth: Seven Bodies of Liberation

The No-Eyes Viewing Wall at Brooklyn Zen Center presents seven large collaborative mindfulness drawings created by members of the Awake Youth program in collaboration with artist Noah Fischer. These drawings depict the Seven Bodies of Liberation, as conceived by the teenagers from within an intensive space of meditation and reflection on their lives as part of the Awake Youth Program, now in its third year. 

Friday June 14th from 7-9 PM

Please sign up for the event on Facebook