694 - Mandala Thangka with the Four-Armed Avalokiteshvara, Buddhist Scroll Painting from the Himalayas

Mandala Thangka with the Four-Armed Avalokiteshvara, Buddhist Scroll Painting from the Himalayas Tempera on linen. Buddhist scroll painting with a mandala on a dark blue ground, framed all round by a red band. At the centre, on a lotus throne, a white four-armed deity, probably the four-armed Avalokiteshvara, the front hands joined before the breast. Around it eight spoke-like segments with small subsidiary figures, around these the square ground plan of the palace with four T-shaped gates, outside a wreath of lotus petals and a ring of vajra elements. In the upper field three seated figures, on the left a green female deity, in the centre a lama dressed in red, on the right a white Buddha; in the lower field three wrathful deities in flaming mandorlas. Condition commensurate with age, small holes, locally thinned areas, slightly rubbed, the edges with creases, 61x45.5 cm (HxW). A mandala depicts the palace in which the deity dwells: a square with four gates at the cardinal points, enclosed by concentric protective circles. In meditation these are passed through from the outside inwards, from the wall of flames of spiritual purification, through the vajra ring of the indestructible diamond nature, to the lotus moat of moral purity. The painting was executed on a prepared fabric smoothed with chalk and glue, the colours being mineral pigments in an animal binder. A scroll painting for collectors of Asian and Buddhist art.