Fūgai Ekun painted several versions of Daruma crossing the Yangtze River on a reed. The subject, a monk traversing the wilderness on pilgrimage, likely resonated with Fūgai, who spent nearly two decades on his own pilgrimage before becoming an abbot at a temple in present-day Kanazawa, a post he held for only two years. Like Daruma, he then took up residence in a cave, where he painted many of these portraits, which he hung at the cave’s entrance. His detailed rendition of Daruma as an unkempt, solitary figure was thus probably derived as much from artistic precedent as from personal experience.

 

—Bradley Bailey