Sand Mandalas: Murals Of Meaning
Tibetan monks visit USC to create art, then destroy it.
By Michael Radcliffe
If you watched the last season of House of Cards, you would have noticed scenes that featured Tibetan monks. In the halls of the Underwood White House, the solemn group draped in their recognizable red and yellow robes spent an entire episode creating an intricately detailed mural from nothing but multi-colored sand. In the end, the entire thing was destroyed — not through tragedy or some unfortunate turn of events (something that tends to follow this show’s First Family), but rather by the monks themselves.
The detailed mural is known as a sand mandala and that is the cycle it follows: tedious and time-consuming creation, followed by a quick destruction. The mural’s end though, is far from meaningless. It “illustrates the nature of impermanence,” says Varun Soni, Dean of Religious Life at USC.
The Office of Religious Life, which Soni heads, oversees spiritual life on campus. Its mission is to challenge students to learn more about the world. Bringing the monks and the sand mandala is a unique experience that few are afforded. Soni himself faced a difficult journey in his original pursuit to view the mandala while traveling through Tibet. Now with this exhibit, free and open the public, things are much easier.
The sand mandala helps one to “reflect on your own life and mind,” says Soni.
The monk’s visit came from a collaboration between the Office of Religious Life and the USC Asia Pacific Museum in Pasadena, which hosted a different group of monks for the creation of a mandala last year.
The group’s spokesperson, Gyalrong Khentul Rinpoche, says that the mandala’s purpose is to “convey messages of compassion.” Rinpoche (both his name and title) and the monks come from the Drepung Loseling Monastery for the Mystical Arts of Tibet. He explains the painstaking process by which they create this mural.
First, monks who have tirelessly studied Buddhist philosophy draw out the detailed geometric lines on a large black table. Rinpoche likens these designers to architects with great skill. The depictions come from Buddhist scripture laid out by the Buddha some 2500 years ago.
Alongside the table are silver and bronze bowls filled many shades of colored sand. The monks use a metal tool with ridges along the top called a chak-pur to scoop the sand. The monk then walks over to the table and scratches his ridged tool with another metal one that ever so lightly allows the sand to flow.
This process is repeated color by color, centimeter by centimeter from the inside out until the image takes form. This image is a fine palace from the top down, colorful with swirls of sand that give detail and depth to the mural.
Yeonsoo Chee of the USC Asia Pacific Museum says that there are many different designs for the mandalas and that each has a distinct meaning. There are also mandalas that appear on paper and silk, depending on who is creating them.
She added that the process of creation and destruction is not binary but is about what the monks are doing in between, including meditation, ritual and prayer.
Rinpoche compares the image to the American flag. Each image individually, is not difficult to draw, but is instead about the history and the meaning of all the pieces that make up the whole. “Everything has meaning and context,” says Rinpoche.
The entire process from beginning to end takes anywhere from 28 to 35 hours. Rinpoche notes that the piece is only on “display for one-half hour… then dismantled.” To the monks it means that “the alluring must end one day.”
This group is currently touring the U.S., bringing forth their message and reflection. Through the mandala, “they will make you more enlightened,” says Rinpoche.
By touring, the monks have three agendas. The first is to spread the message of the Dalai Lama and the oneness of humanity. They also seek to increase awareness of the Tibetan cause, being freedom for their region. Finally, they wish to raise money for their monastery back home. According to Rinpoche, it is the key to survival of the Tibetan culture.
To visit the sand mandala in person, go to “the Fishbowl” at the University Religious Center on the main USC campus. The monks will be working on the mural from nine to five each day this week, finishing Friday at 3:30 p.m. with the ceremony that will wipe away this mural forever.
Even monks aren’t immune to the struggles with L.A. traffic. “We were stuck in traffic for three hours to go 17 miles,” lamented Rinpoche. “Make sure you put that in there.”
Michael Radcliffe is a Masters of Science candidate in Journalism at USC Annenberg. Reach him here.
