Claire Heisler's Articles on Lions Roar

"Through uniting Zen concepts with furniture, Eric Manigian unites spirituality, art, and practical objects." Furniture designer Eric Manigian was a young artist, fresh from a BFA in Sculpture at Pratt Institute, when he decided to organize an extended trip through Asia. In Japan, he was awed by the grace of Zen architecture, and decided to stay for a year as a Zen student at Daitokuji temple in Kyoto. Later, in New York, he studied traditional hand-carving techniques, and decided to bring Zen into his furniture design. In his interview with Brookyn Modern, Manigian states, “I came to understand design as a way to express subtle, poetic, or simple ideas while being grounded by the sincerity and integrity of craftsmanship and utility.” Through uniting Zen concepts with furniture, he unites spirituality, art, and practical objects. Manigian’s latest work, Ensô Table, speaks for itself. It is a large-scale table shaped as an ensô, a traditional Zen symbol, which is drawn in calligraphy with a single, meditative stroke. The ensô represents the wholeness of life, as spheres are the shape of the earth, sun, and moon. Some Zen practitioners draw the ensô daily as a spiritual exercise, for there is the belief that only a spiritually complete person can draw a true ensô. Eric Manigian’s past reflects his respect for Zen philosophy; however, his use of the ensô could also be seen to reflect the co-option of religious symbols by secular commercial art. Most of Manigian’s art goes to high-profile private clients. The Ensô Table was shown at BKLYN Designs, which is presented by the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, May 8-10, 2009. Audrey Yoshiko Seo, in Ensô: Zen Circles of Enlightenment, writes: “Zen art, as sacred art, is a direct expression of the ineffable. It helps to transform the way we understand ourselves and the universe… All of this notwithstanding, ultimately we should appreciate that the ensô has no reason or point for its existence other than itself. It exists perfectly and completely, and is aesthetically gratifying for its own sake. The ensô is its own merit and its own reward… The fruit of the ensô is the ensô.” Whether the Ensô Table is fruitful, is up to the ensô.

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