Stephen Batchelor's Collages and Photographs Explore Buddhist Ethics in Arles

This summer, a newly established Zen centre in Arles, France, showcased the collages and photographs of Stephen Batchelor, a Buddhist author and artist originally from Scotland. His exhibition displayed creations crafted from repurposed materials, organized into solid cubes featuring four distinct colors: yellow, white, blue, and red. Born in the 1950s, Batchelor initially faced rejection when he pursued photography as a teenager. He later immersed himself in Tibetan communities in northern India and the Korean Son tradition before disrobing in the mid-1980s. His artistic approach reflects Buddhist principles of compassion and inquiry. Batchelor's recent iPhone photographs, enhanced with the 'silvertone' filter, depict his journeys in Peru and life in La Sauve, South France. His 2015 book, After Buddhism, critiques Buddhist biographies, promoting a secular perspective, while his 2020 work, The Art of Solitude, explores Vipassana meditation alongside artists Agnes Martin and Antony Gormley. Suraj Yengde reviewed the exhibition for ArtReview Asia's Autumn 2026 issue. Batchelor views art as a “nonconceptual pairing to the written works,” prioritizing practice over theory, and his collages challenge abstract notions through found objects, continuing a lineage that visualizes ethical concepts within Buddhist art. The exhibition underscored his commitment to advancing Buddhist philosophical traditions through artistic expression.