100 monsters

a one-year class and a practice

Listen to me for a second about the effects

Of a certain medicine.

The pill I'm talking about is called

Penetrating-One's-Nature-and-Becoming-a Buddha...

Chew it well, chew it well—

Won't you take my pill?

Hakuin

100 Monsters

last Tuesday of each month, from October 2024 through October 2025

7-8 pm EST by zoom

free to OMZL members/non-members by donation

This practice has its roots in Japanese folklore, in the Hyakki Yagyō [Night Parade]. It's a Japanese myth over 1,000 years old. Imagine a procession of fantastic, frightening creatures, ogres and goblins, orderly or riotous, marching through the nighttime streets. The Night Parade served as a literary trope and also a fantastic opportunity for Japanese artists to draw and paint grotesques.

It was Zen Master Hakuin Ekaku (January 19, 1686 – January 18, 1769) who took up the Night Parade as an introspective Zen practice. He painted 100 creatures—monsters—each reflecting some aspect of his personal experience. In 2002 Lynda Barry shared 17 of her own monsters, and told their (her) stories, in her illustrated book One! Hundred! Demons!.

100 monsters is not an art class, but a supporting method for Zen inquiry and self-realization. While a creative professional might take up this practice to generate content and overcome blocks, the intent for this course is not to produce skillful drawings. We will draw as we can, for the sake of self-awareness and awakening. Stick figures and text bubbles are fully effective.

Again, to be clear: skill in painting and drawing are not taught or valued in this class space. Picking and choosing what is or isn't a "good" drawing of a monster is a distraction, and possibly a spiritual bypass. If we choose, we can learn to be just as pleased (even more so) by humble marks made with honesty and courage.

Guidelines

Students will not at any point be asked to share their drawings. As this practice settles and matures, we may find a way for students who want to share to do so! But not-sharing may be the wiser practice for people who are strongly oriented towards external validation.

While participating in this practice space, students are required to preserve their own monster work. It's suggested to use a bound blank book of some type; a Mead composition notebook is perfectly fine (and has exactly 100 sheets). If you choose to use water media (a brush and ink or watercolors) you might like heavier paper... but please know that Lynda Barry painted her monsters on yellow legal pads. And would use nothing else.

Drawings done on loose sheets can always be taped in.

Take it as a sangha commitment and the very bones of this practice, that you will not rip out and destroy that which you judge as ugly and unskilled. Instead, turn the page.

Vocabulary note

Hyakki Yagyō is popularly translated into English as "Night Parade of 100 Demons." But demons have a specific, elaborate mythology from Judeo-Christian culture that does not lend itself to Zen introspective work. Demons are imagined as attacking from outside, as other than ourselves. Therefore we will use the more general term monsters.

Some Resources

If you find additional links and resources, please email them for inclusion.

Stephen Addiss discusses Hakuin's Zen and art practice in The Art of Zen. *

Lynda Barry (following Hakuin) re-introduced this practice in her 2002 illustrated book One! Hundred! Demons!. *

Here's a roundup of older to recent depictions of the Night Parade.

Night Parade of One Hundred Demons by Mochizuki Gyokusen (Japanese, 1692–1755)

Contemporary Christian contemplative Anna Havron shared about her experience of the practice.

*Local students can review copies at OMZL.