THE WRITTEN ASSIGNMENT:
Part 1: Go through the permanent collection in the rooms that I said would work with our assignment—and only those rooms.
Describe in minute detail ONE artwork or object which reminded you of Cage, Kaprow, and what I said about Zen. Check with me
to make sure. Take a photo of it, no flash, unless a guard forbids. Make notes in the museum. Number that, Part 1. One page,
maximum! Weight: ONLY 10 points. For a bonus: write the whole page without using the word “is” or “was”! Alert me that you’re
trying to do it.

Part 2: Sit, contemplating the piece you chose, for at least four minutes and thirty three seconds. Once one of my students
contemplated a Robert Ryman for nearly two hours, but he had been a Zen monk. Expect it to be hard work. There will be
alternating periods of boredom and interest. You’ve practiced.

Back at home, in From Humanism to Mysticism (or Into the Light of Things, if you already bought it), re-read Part I, Chapter
A. Arthur Danto and “the End of Art,” and Part I, Chapter C, from the section titled, “Emerson, Whitman, and Concept Art,”
through the section titled, “Emerson, Whitman: ‘I cannot go back to toys,’” to learn about this kind of art’s goal: the
“transfiguration of the commonplace,” the mystical wonder of ordinary things. Does it relate to your experience with the
painting? Explain how. Quote the book, be specific. Title this Part 2. Minimum, three pages. I’m only looking for your new
command of the technical terms and concepts relating to this topic! I MARK ON THE PROSE. THIS IS JUST A WRITING ASSIGNMENT,
AS FAR AS THE MARK IS CONCERNED. You don’t have to reach nirvana or satori! Weight: Eighty points! Spend time here. Write
according to the hints in Break Writer’s Block. Change passive to active, cut “is” and “was” every chance you can and
substitute just the right word. Use simple active verbs.

Part 3, one page only. OPTIONAL. Tell me if you had any visual or auditory experiences after contemplation that struck you as
novel or unusual. (Avoid telling me you found faces, skulls, etc. hidden in the painting. People can find them even in
clouds, if they look long enough.) The experiences usually will happen within 72 hours after you left the museum. You may not
realize they happened until well after they did. If you had none, just report that, in good prose. Amazingly, most people
will have one. That’s why we value this kind of art: it works. Weight for Question 3: 10 points IF YOU CHOOSE TO DO IT. (for
the prose, not for the experience or lack of it.) NO DEDUCTION FOR SKIPPING THIS QUESTION.

From Humanism to Mysticism (or Into the Light of Things, if you already bought it) will be used with the museum visit.
IF YOU DID NOT GO TO THE MUSEUM when I lectured there and helped people YOU HAVE TO GO ON YOUR OWN, and attach your ticket
plus a selfie of yourself with the work you’re writing about— not just the work itself. Same due date.

We begin the idea of mysticism, and avant garde art since Impressionism (a mystic art) and American Zen buddhist mysticism in
particular. We have already tried doing mysticism once. Reading assignment below.

To start, consider a story in the news. I have seen similar mummified monk tombs in China. Does this kind of Buddhism have
any resemblance to what you’ve heard called Zen, or mysticism? None! When we meditated, we were trying to increase our
experience of life. This monk was meditating, but he was trying to die— and in the end, he poisoned himself to mummify his
dying body. Completely different, completely opposite goals from America’s Zen. But he is far more typical of mainstream
Buddhism’s original ideas. The link is probably dead but you can google it if you’re curious.

Buddha statue reveals remains of mummified monk inside – The Washington Post
Attached are pictures from Daisen-in, a temple, built in the early 1500s inside the Daitoku-ji temple complex in Kyoto,
Japan. This is one of the main temples of Rinzai Zen Buddhism, the type of Zen which most influenced America. Indeed, we
don’t know there’s any other kind of Zen, or indeed, of Buddhism. But Japanese Zen is a small, late sect within the giant
complex of very different religions respectful of Buddha’s teachings, much the way Unitarianism or Presbyterianism, say, is a
small sect within Christianity, a giant complex of religions respectful of Christ’s.

To understand what happened, read, in From Humanism to Mysticism, the sections called “Suzuki and Suffusion” and “Chicago
Zen.” You can scan the first section, but read carefully “Chicago Zen,” the story of how D.T. Suzuki invented what Americans
think is Zen while he was living outside Chicago. The first section describes how Suzuki’s Zen pretty much took over the art
world, then the colleges, then many American religions in the Sixties, and eventually turned into the heart of what we now
call the “ecology” movement. If you’re green— you’re Zen. But only Suzuki’s Zen.

Look at the famous “dry” rock garden at Daisen-in (about 1510) and then compare it with one of the French painter Claude
Monet’s many paintings of haystacks, done 1890-91, without any knowledge of the Japanese garden. You’ll notice a striking
resemblance and start to get the idea. The West reinvented mysticism, but this time it happened in the arts, not in the
churches.

Haystacks (Monet) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The paper should be written about Asian art museum of San Francisco