in response to a question

Meditation relates to art the same way that violence, depression, joy, sex, fear, and love relate to art. People’s art is always a reflection of something in them. Early people were awed by the power of great beasts and so depicted them. They also portrayed pregnant women a thing which ensured the continuance of their species and represented the wonder of the creation of life, something people have always been fascinated by. (It was not early pornography as one of my old roommates believed. At least I hope it was not just about large breasts or my opinion of our species may drop a bit) They portrayed creatures that died so that they could live, and kept charms and relics to try to obtain the power of the animal. They were enraptured by the things that allowed survival in a very brutal and difficult world. Calm meditations have also been an important part in the life of all peoples, and it will be reflected in their art or in the process of making the art. No where is this more evident than in the older East Asian ink paintings. Many of their works were meditations both in the creation process and in the subject matter. Plum and cherry blossoms, sedate old grove forests, mountains with waterfalls. tigers and cranes. Grace and power. Beauty and death. Rebirth and violence. Stillness at the edge of movement. And, the kami, the soul and God. If not these things, what do we ponder? With the exception of some commissioned works (perhaps not even there) artists find a way to represent what is important in their lives one way of another. Some have shown the horrors of war while others created images that lend to a calm meditative state to be observed at anytime, and still others create images out of their unconscious brought to light by dreams or deep meditative states, and to many other things to list.