Pan Li-shui's art

Taipei's Baoan Temple is one of my favorite places of worship because the interior artwork is superb. The 1995-2002 restoration of the shrine won an honourable mention in the 2003 UNESCO Asia-Pacific Heritage Awards for Culture Conservation.

Many of the paintings were executed by Pan Li-shui (潘麗水, 1914-1995), one of Taiwan's most famous temple artists. His father,  Pan Chun-yuan (潘春源, died 1972) was also a noted painted. Pan Li-shui's son Pan Yue-xiong (潘岳雄, born 1943) assisted his father in the 1960s and 1970s and now works independently. During the Kominka Movement in the 1930s, when many temples were closed or demolished as part of the Japanese colonial authorities' efforts to make Taiwan culturally more Japanese, Pan Li-shui and his father survived by designing advertisements.

Works by Pan Li-shui can also be seen in Nankunshen Daitian Temple and Fahua Temple, both in Tainan, and - I just saw them last week - in Dajia's Jenn Lann Temple.