The Second Coming of the Fifth Patriarch (c. mid-1300s): Art, History and Details

The Second Coming of the Fifth Patriarch (c. mid-1300s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Yintuoluo (Chinese, c. 1285-c. 1355).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

A small boy, accompanied by his mother, is closing his hands in greeting to an old monk who has a young attendant standing behind him. Scholars believe the scene is a meeting between the fourth patriarch of Chan Buddhism, Daoxin 道信, and the little boy, who was the reincarnation of an old monk named Zaisong daozhe 栽松道者 (Pine Planter). They had encountered before, during which Daoxin advised the Pine Planter to endure a reincarnation as he was too old to reach enlightenment. This painting is done by Yintuoluo, an artist renowned for his simple and unadorned style.

Object facts

• Title: The Second Coming of the Fifth Patriarch
• Date: c. mid-1300s
• Creator attribution: Yintuoluo (Chinese, c. 1285-c. 1355)
• Culture: China, Yuan dynasty (1271-1368)
• Type: Painting
• Technique: section of a handscroll mounted as a hanging scroll, ink on paper
• Dimensions: Image: 32.7 x 44.6 cm (12 7/8 x 17 9/16 in.); Overall: 245 x 62 cm (96 7/16 x 24 7/16 in.)
• Collection: ASIAN - Hanging scroll
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1967.211

A detail from the museum

This painting is just a section of a handscroll that has been remounted as a hanging scroll.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Inoue, Shōzō. Daibi: Ōsaka Bijutsu Kurabu 50-shūnen, Ōsaka Shōsei Kumiai 70-shūnen kinen [大美 : 大阪美術俱楽部五十周年, 大阪商盛組合七十周年記念 = Special exhibition in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Osaka Art Club and the 75th anniversary of the Osaka Art Dealers Association]. Ōsaka: Ōsaka Bijutsu Kurabu, 1960.
• Lee, Sherman E., and Wai-kam Ho. Chinese Art Under the Mongols: The Yüan Dynasty, 1279-1368. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art; [distributed by the Press of Case Western Reserve University], 1968.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1969. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1969.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.