Huachan 畫禪

Huachan 畫禪 is a book on Buddhist painting written during the Ming period 明 (1368-1644) by the monk Lianru 蓮儒, style Baishi Shanna 白石山衲.

Huachan is also a general term for "Buddhist-style painting". The painter's work is influenced by the thought of Zen (chan 禪, Sanskr. dhyāna), in that he must stop thinking about worldly matters and concentrate on his painting. The term also refers to the transmission of painting styles, painting methods, and genres from one generation of artists to the next (chan zhe, chuan ye 禪者，傳也 "dhyāna means transmission").

The book of 1 juan length is an extract of Wang Shizhen's 王世貞 (1526-1590) Huayuan 畫苑 and Xia Yuanyan's 夏元彥 (fl. 1365) Tuhui baojian 圖繪寶鑒. It assembles information on the paintings of Buddhist masters included in the two books. These are the artworks of 64 monks, but there are many omissions regarding the history of Buddhist painting, for instance, the artists Juezhao 絕照, Tianran 天然, Kulin 枯林, Nanyueyun 南嶽雲, Liangong 蓮公 or Zhongtang 鏡塘. For this reason, the Huachan was not included in the imperial series Siku quanshu 四庫全書.

The text is, however, included in the series Baoyantang miji 寶顏堂秘笈, Guang baichuan xuehai 百川學海, Xu shuofu 續說郛, Congshu jicheng chubian 叢書集成初編, Meishu congshu 美術叢書 and Huashi congshu 畫史叢書.