Practise-Mandalas from the Journey
Click on an image to enlarge
| next/ | home |
|
|
|
 |
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
 |
For Sales, enquires and Comissions
Artist Statement
"Practise"
Practise > verb
1.Perform (an activity) or exercise (a skill) repeatedly in order to improve or maintain proficiency in it.
2.Carry out or perform (an activity or custom) habitually or regularly.
3. Be engaged in (a particular profession)
Practice > noun-
verb US spelling of PRACTISE
1. The actual application of a plan or method, as opposed to the theories relating to it
2. The customary way of doing something
3. The practiising of an activity or skill
4. The practicing of a profession
In one way or another my life has been about creativity and spirituality for close to 30 years – I create mandalas, play guitar, sing, write, study, teach and perform yoga and meditation: You guessed it, a lot of my life is about practice.
When I was living in Dharamsala last year I had the wonderful good fortunate to meet and chat with the Venerable Tenzin Palamo
. She asked me what I was doing in Dharmasala and I told her as well as teaching English to the women weavers I had set up a music program there and was teaching guitar o the younger refugees
.
She paused and thought for a moment and then said
`Yes that could be a good practice`. That statement has had me mediating on her words ever since. Tenzin Palmo spent 12 years living alone in a cave in the Himalayas. In all that time she never lay down to sleep.
Sometimes people ask me what I gained from living for so many years in a cave.
I say, "It’s not what I gained, it’s what I lost. Tenzin Palamo
We’ve all got to make our own journey towards the reality of putting it into practice – whatever `it` is , as opposed to just thinking or talking about doing it. It’s taken me more than twenty years to turn up to the cushion each morning to practice meditation
That’s not to say that I haven’t been practicing meditation over the past twenty years I have.
My mandala artwork has served me as the primary form of meditation and contemplation throughout my life so far. It has taught me so much, developed my powers of concentration and insight, helped me travel through many inner landscapes and allowed me the space and time to heal many of life’s hurts and bruises as well as celebrate many of life’s victories. As a practitioner I highly recommend the art of the mandala to everybody.
Mandalas are about looking for wholeness in the process, about finding a starting point and letting things come together gradually from there. Stepping out of the world of doing into the world of being and then back; they are a journey not a destination.
That brings me to this Multifaith arts festival; I believe at its core it’s about Faith! Faith- that is my aspiration in life- to have and to practice Faith-not of any particular denomination, religion or culture but to practice positive thinking and kindness and a belief in the greater good.I don’t know how it works; just that it does and I don’t know of any practitioner, whether it is in the form of a spiritual teacher and leader, a visual artist or a great musician who has finished practising.
Through actual practice in his daily life man well fulfils the aim of all religion, whatever his denomination
H.H. The XIVth Dalai Lama
The mandalas in this exhibition were inspired by my travel both external and internal over the past couple of years. The latest series of mandala arose from my time in India where I lived and worked in Dharmasala with the Tibetans living there in exile. I also travelled high up into the Himalayas to Laddak, where I visited some of the most ancient monasteries in the Buddhist world. In January this year I completed my pilgrimage by attending the Kalachakra ceremony in Amaravati South India.
Thank you for visiting my exhibition, I wish you well on your journey and joy in your practice.