Back in early February of ’06 I picked up a Hamilton Spectator. Inside was a photo of two Tibetan monks from the Drepung Gomang monastery, and a small writeup, mentioning they were on a North American tour, and that they would be in the Hamilton/Burlington area shortly.
I apprised Andrew (from Cottage13) of this and we checked out their itinerary. In two weeks they were scheduled for a talk at the RBG one afternoon and a demonstration at a school one morning. They’re here for two weeks, and that’s it?
Andrew quickly got the ball rolling. He knew of an empty church on Locke Street that he rented for a week. I did up posters and we distributed them around Toronto, Hamilton, Burlington.
They agreed to do a sand mandala. Andrew once again got on it. They required a 5' by 5' , 1" thick board. Most plywood isn’t that thick, and most of it is 4' by 8'. Exotic Woods in Burlington had that size of Finnish birch plywood. He glued a 1⁄2" and 3⁄4" piece together, and painted it a deep, dark blue, as requested.
The opening ceremony about to begin.
The woman on the left is Tenzin, their interpreter. She’s from the Hamilton area originally and through a confluence of events, after traveling through Tibet, ended up at the Drepung Gomang monastery in India.
The opening ceremony lasted about a half hour, and consisted of the monks consecrating the site and calling forth the forces of goodness through chanting mantras accompanied by flutes, drums and cymbals.
Then the layout began, which took about three exacting hours. The construction of the mandala begins with the drawing of the design on the base, or tek-pu. The artists measure out and draw the architectural lines using a straight-edged ruler, compass and ink pen. The mandala is a formal geometric pattern showing the floor plan of a sacred mansion. Only the large areas were marked out. Once those were covered up with the sand, all the small detail would have to be added freehand.
It starts.
I could be wrong, but I believe the sand is actually crushed marble coloured with vegetable dyes or opaque tempera.
All that concentration has the lad tuckered right out.
The implement that the monks use is called a chak-pur. A long, thin metal funnel with scallops along the top. The end is plugged up, the coloured sand is scooped into the large end, and a long metal rod is rasped along the scallops to make the grains roll out the end. The two chak-purs are said to symbolize the union of wisdom and compassion.
For the four days that they worked on the mandala, the church was visited by scores of curious onlookers.
At the Kalachakra for World Peace that had been held at the SkyDome in Toronto two years before, a sand mandala had been done, and you could file past a roped off display along with thousands of other people to get a quick glimpse. What made this so special was that you could sit and watch the whole thing develop at your leisure and at close range. And what they created was a thing of breathtaking beauty and perfection.
In Tibetan Buddhism, a mandala is an imaginary palace that is contemplated during meditation. Each object in the palace has significance, representing some aspect of wisdom or reminding the meditator of some guiding principle. Various scriptural texts dictate the shapes, forms, and colors of the mandala. There are many different mandalas, each with different lessons to teach and blessings to confer. Most mandalas contain a host of deities, symbolic archetypes of the landscape of the mind.
Besides sand, mandalas can also be made from powdered flowers, herbs or grains. In ancient times, powdered precious and semi-precious gems were also used. Thus, lapis lazuli would be used for the blues, rubies for the reds, and so forth.
Every tantric system has its own mandala, and thus each one symbolizes an existential and spiritual approach. For example, that of Lord Avalokiteshvara symbolizes compassion as a central focus of the spiritual experience; that of Lord Manjushri takes wisdom as the central focus; and that of Vajrapani emphasizes the need for courage and strength in the quest for sacred knowledge. Medicine Buddha mandalas are created to generate powers of healing.
The precision and the detail is truly astonishing.
In general, all mandalas have outer, inner, and secret meaning. On the outer level they represent the world in its divine form; on the inner level, they represent a map by which the ordinary human mind is transformed into the enlightened mind; and on the secret level, they predict the primordially perfect balance of the subtle energies of the body and the clear light dimension of the mind. The creation of a sand painting is said to affect purification and healing on these three levels.
If anyone is curious these can and have been preserved, although it is very rarely done. I know of one that was preserved, an Amitayus sand mandala made by Drepung Loseling monks in December of 1993. After the mandala was finished, Krylon Crystal Clear (#1301) was sprayed over the entire surface. Approximately 6 to 8 cans of varnish were used to consolidate a 5' by 5' mandala, applied in repeated coats with a 10 to 15 minute interval between coats. (A senior chemist at Krylon was confident that this fixative is an extremely stable acrylic resin formulation and stated that many successful aging tests had been performed without any yellowing.)
That! Is! Awesome!
In addition to the sand mandala, the monks gave lectures and classes about various other art forms they do. Quite a few schools sent classes down to see and hear the monks demonstrate a few different mediums, and let the kids try their hand at it.
One medium that has been used traditionally in Tibet for sculpture is butter. This shows some of what they create with butter.
There were many other examples of their artwork on display including many thangka paintings.
Buddha on the Lake
Chenrezig (Avalokiteshvara) - Buddha of Compassion
Gonpo (Mahakala)
Green Tara
Buddha of Legend
Lords of Three Families (Avalokiteshvara, Manjushri, Vajrapani)
Training the Mind
Oser Chenmo
Three Long Life Deities: Amitayus, White Tara, and Namgyelma
On Saturday was the closing ceremony.
People starting to file in.
The church was absolutely packed. People were lined up outside who couldn’t get in. It could have been put on in a building twice as big and it would have been packed.
The monks started the closing ceremonies with chanting and reciting mantras accompanied by flutes, drums and cymbals.
Then the Abbott walked up and sliced the four quadrants with his scepter.
Then some of the other monks proceeded to sweep all the sand into a bowl. You could hear audible gasps from people who likely had no idea of what was to happen.
I love the look of shock on the womans face.
The symbolism of course is the impermanence of all things.
Small amounts of the coloured sand were put into little ziplock baggies and distributed to members of the audience.
Then the proceedings were taken to one of the waterfalls that tumbled over the Escarpment.
Pouring the sand that so much loving energy has been devoted to into the water is meant to carry healing energies throughout the world.
The week after they gave a demonstration of Tibetan cultural practices, including dance, singing, music, costumed plays and monastic debates.
I heard that Hamilton was the most successful stop on their entire North American tour. They had more donations here, and sold more of their art here than anywhere else. The purpose of the tour was to raise money for the Monastery, since they have no other means of support otherwise. The Indian government has given Tibetan refugees land for several monasteries throughout India, but they give them no financial support.
Drepung Gomang Monastery
One interesting postscript to the story is that one of the monks, Tsulstrim, jumped ship. While all of them were undoubtedly talented, he was the most talented of the bunch. I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say that he is an artist of a calibre on par with Robert Bateman, or very capable of attaining that level. He’s that good. He had an offer to be artist in residence at McGill, and just wanted to broaden his artistic horizons in general. He realized that in order to do so he needed to leave the confines of a monastery. The opportunity to come to North America is not one that will come around too often. He can’t just go and buy a plane ticket and take off from India and travel wherever he likes on a whim. He is a monk after all, living in a monastery. He made a big leap, leaving the cloistered environs of a life that he’s known since he was a very small boy, to enter into the culture shock maelstrom that is life in North America. He has applied for refugee status and is now living in Toronto. He did live in Hamilton for about a year, because as he put it, “In Toronto, many Tibetans. I not learn English. In Hamilton, no Tibetans. I have to learn English.” He’s expressed an interest in learning tattooing, and I have no doubt that if he was to learn that medium, he would be very, very good at it.
Some mandalas done in other cities on their North American tour.
Dayton, Ohio.
Lafayette, Georgia
Louisville, Kentucky
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
And three common mandala designs, with descriptions of what the different areas mean.
Amitayus
Chenrezig
Medicine Buddha
(photos provided by Andrew Little and the Drepung Gomang Monastery)
Those wall hangings – stunning!
Mandala is a Sanskrit word meaning cosmogram or “world in harmony.” Mandalas are drawings in three-dimensional forms of sand. In Tibetan, this art is called dul-tson-kyil-khor which means “mandala of colored powders.”
In addition to the sand mandala, the monks gave lectures and classes about various other art forms they do. Quite a few schools sent classes down to see and hear the monks demonstrate a few different mediums, and let the kids try their hand at it.
There were many other examples of their artwork on display including many thangka paintings.
On Saturday was the closing ceremony.
Then the proceedings were taken to one of the waterfalls that tumbled over the Escarpment.
The week after they gave a demonstration of Tibetan cultural practices, including dance, singing, music, costumed plays and monastic debates.
One interesting postscript to the story is that one of the monks, Tsulstrim, jumped ship. While all of them were undoubtedly talented, he was the most talented of the bunch. I don’t think it’s any exaggeration to say that he is an artist of a calibre on par with Robert Bateman, or very capable of attaining that level. He’s that good. He had an offer to be artist in residence at McGill, and just wanted to broaden his artistic horizons in general. He realized that in order to do so he needed to leave the confines of a monastery. The opportunity to come to North America is not one that will come around too often. He can’t just go and buy a plane ticket and take off from India and travel wherever he likes on a whim. He is a monk after all, living in a monastery. He made a big leap, leaving the cloistered environs of a life that he’s known since he was a very small boy, to enter into the culture shock maelstrom that is life in North America. He has applied for refugee status and is now living in Toronto. He did live in Hamilton for about a year, because as he put it, “In Toronto, many Tibetans. I not learn English. In Hamilton, no Tibetans. I have to learn English.” He’s expressed an interest in learning tattooing, and I have no doubt that if he was to learn that medium, he would be very, very good at it.
Some mandalas done in other cities on their North American tour.
And three common mandala designs, with descriptions of what the different areas mean.
(photos provided by Andrew Little and the Drepung Gomang Monastery)
Posts
That was pretty amazing! Wish I could've been there!
ReplyDelete