Section 1: An Empty Canvas, An Empty Mind

Art Historian: Master, I wanted to begin with a piece by the artist Kazimir Malevich—a black square on a white canvas. In the West, we see this as a radical break, a move toward pure form. But looking at it, I am reminded of the Zen concept of 'emptiness.' The vast, unadorned space in minimalist art, the deliberate absence of content... it seems to be reaching for the same idea that Zen has cultivated for centuries. Is modern minimalism, in your view, a kind of unconscious Zen practice?

Zen Master: You see with a sharp eye, but you see the surface. The emptiness of the canvas is a physical one—an absence of objects. It is a quiet space, and quiet is good. But the emptiness we speak of in Zen, śūnyatā, is an emptiness of a different kind. It is not an empty space, but an empty self. It is the realization that there is no fixed, solid 'you' at the center of your experience—only a constant flow of thoughts, sensations, and perceptions. The minimalist painting is a quiet room. Zen emptiness is the silent observer who sits within it, unattached to the room itself.