Japanese Rock Garden — 枯山水 Karesansui
Often called a Zen Garden , the Japanese stone garden — (枯山水 Karesansui ) is a type of garden that suggests mountains and water using only stones, sand or gravel, and occasionally plants. Water is symbolized by the arrangement of rock forms to create a dry waterfall and by patterns in the raked sand to create a dry flow or, like the blank space in Japanese paintings, emptiness and distance.
In the Sakuteiki (first known manual of Japanese gardening) there are several rules for the organization of the rocks in a karesansui . One must “ensure that all stones, from the front of the arrangement, are placed with the best faces showing. If a stone has a not very attractive top it should be placed so as to give prominence to its side. There should always be more horizontal stones than vertical stones”
The most common arrangement is one or more groups of three rocks. A common triad arrangement has upright stone flanked by two smaller rocks, representing the Buddha and his two attendants.
