Beautiful Buddhist Mandalas From Around The World (PHOTOS)

The Dalai Lama is in Washington D.C. from July 6-16, leading a gathering of thousands of Buddhists through the "Kalachakra for World Peace." Central to the kalachakra ritual is the design and creation of a mandala.

HuffPost blogger Matteo Pistono explains:

Central to the bestowing of the Kalachakra initiation is the creation of a mandala. "Mandala" literally means "center and circumference" and in the tantric context connotes a circular diagram symbolizing a universe with a deity in the center of his or her palace complete with entourage, gatekeepers, and a surrounding environment. Mandalas are painted on cloth and temple walls, created from colored sand, or fashioned from wood, stone or colored threads.

We've collected pictures of several beautiful mandalas, created by Buddhist monks in different locations around the world. Enjoy!

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• Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

  Tibetan Buddhist monks work on a mandala, January 20, 2002 at the Smithsonian Arthur M. Sackler Gallery in Washington, DC. (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

• Broward Library, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

  A Tibetan monk works on creating a mandala at the Broward County Main Library February 6, 2007 in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

• National Mall, Washington, D.C.

  A monk from the Drepung Loseling Monastery in Tibet works on a mandala at the National Mall during the last weekend of the 36th Annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival 'The Silk Road' in Washington, DC, 06 July 2002. (Photo by Hiroko Masuike/Getty Images)

• Rubin Museum of Art, New York

  Lama Karma Tenzin, a Bhutanese monk, creates a sand mandala December 31, 2008 at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York. (Photo by Stan Honda/Getty Images)

• Hamburg, Germany

  Tibetan nuns pray 22 June 2003 in Hamburg's ethnographical Museum, in front of a mandala made of colored sand. (Photo by Roland Magunia/Getty Images)

• Bangalore, India

  Tibetan Buddhist monks prepare a mandala during an exhibition at the Thank You India Festival in Bangalore on November 23, 2009. (Photo by Dibyangshu Sarkar/Getty Images)

• Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

  Maroon-robed Buddhist monks spread colored sand across a mandala at Washington's Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Friday Aug. 7, 1998 to help explain a 1,000-year-old system of medicine. (Photo by Khue Bui / AP Photo)

• Prague Museum, Czech Republic

  Tibetan monks create a mandala at the Prague Museum, Czech Republic on Tuesday March 7, 2006. (Photo by Petr David Josek / AP Photo)

• Bremen, Germany

  Four Tibetan nuns create a mandala at the Overseas Museum in Bremen, northern Germany, Friday, Nov. 4, 2005. (AP Photo/Joerg Sarbach)

• Rostov-on-Don, Russia

  A Buddhist monk from Gyudmed Monastery creates a mandala in a museum in Rostov-on-Don, about 1,000 kilometers south of Moscow, Thursday, Feb. 8, 2007. (AP Photo/Sergei Venyavsky)

Comments

[eric14]

02:45 PM on 07/23/2011

Here you are:

http://www­.google.co­.uk/search­?q=mandala­s&hl=en&sa­fe=off&rlz­=1C1CHFX_e­n-GBGB437G­B437&prmd=­ivns&sourc­e=lnms&tbm­=isch&ei=S­RYrTq-aAsX­BhAf3u8SqC­w&sa=X&oi=­mode_link&­ct=mode&cd­=2&ved=0CB­YQ_AUoAQ&b­iw=1920&bi­h=979

[jephrozster]

04:15 PM on 07/11/2011

Love these photos. I recently photographed a Mandala in Berkeley, CA, check it out...

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.176739395715322.65395.169248809797714

[HawaiiSteve]

01:14 PM on 07/14/2011

Fanned! Lovely work. I especially liked the close-ups. Where was this in Berkeley?

[JavaJuice]

04:00 PM on 07/11/2011

I was fortunate enough to see one of these created over the course of 5 days in Miami a few years ago. Truly incredible experience it brought out really positive energy to all that observed.

[Conjoe]

02:58 PM on 07/11/2011

Beautiful. Reminded me of recent commentary from the Oregonian:

http://www.oregonlive.com/opinion/index.ssf/2011/07/religious_plurality_and_polari.html

[season555]

12:45 PM on 07/11/2011

WOW

[powercosmic]

10:19 AM on 07/11/2011

What an incredible waste of time!

Clearly these blokes have wwaaaa-aay to much time on their hands.

[Thankgoodness]

01:37 AM on 07/12/2011

your comment shows more about you then about them

[powercosmic]

09:36 AM on 07/12/2011

Hey, don't worry, I get it.

I like art, I like beautiful things, and I admire people who can imagine are create such things, (I'm a bit of an Artist, myself).

I also have a special place in my heart for Buddism, since it does not imply a supernatural deity of any kind, so in my view it is not a "religion".

But really, who has time to do this stuff?

[ZenGardner]

07:31 AM on 07/11/2011

Vewy Buddhaful...

[Gregor53]

11:19 AM on 07/10/2011

Beautiful form of art that also provides peace and beauty.

[eric14]

02:44 PM on 07/23/2011

Here you are:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=mandalas&hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1C1CHFX_en-GBGB437GB437&prmd=ivns&source=lnms&tbm=isch&ei=SRYrTq-aAsXBhAf3u8SqCw&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&ved=0CBYQ_AUoAQ&biw=1920&bih=979

[AlsoSarah]

10:20 AM on 07/10/2011

Simple Mandalas for coloring are great for helping children relax also. It calms them down and they love them too. A great rainy day activity. You can google them free online and print them out.

[AlsoSarah]

10:15 AM on 07/10/2011

I absolutely love Mandalas. Beautiful art.

[shaardula]

09:31 AM on 07/10/2011

mandala has a tantric context. it does not mean its only context is tantric. not every mandala is so heavy, in form or context or purpose. many are simple and samsaari (this worldly). many are free interpretations of the women who create them.

[JoeBoy254]

08:29 AM on 07/10/2011

Peace and harmony............what more can one say.

[msjimmied]

06:38 AM on 07/10/2011

There is so much beauty in every culture. It's really too bad that the conservatives refuse to see it, that wondrous many aspects of the divine. The kingdom of god is within you, be silent before him, turn inward...perhaps with these quiet meditative exercises.

[sachazg]

04:58 AM on 07/10/2011

sad that Aspen is not on the list

[kooldalai]

07:20 PM on 07/10/2011

They were here in KC in 1998 and matbe a couple tmes since. They don't get to a lot of places. One was done in Arkansas when the Dalai Lama was there in May. I love watching them work...so gentle and focused.

[jrb35]

03:52 AM on 07/10/2011

You forgot to mention the best part about sand mandalas. After they're completed, the monks lift them up and pour the sand away, destroying the creation. As I understand it, the act is meant to symbolize the fleeting nature of life.

The Minneapolis Institute of Art has an amazing sand mandala in their permanent collection. After it was created for the museum, it was sprayed with some type of sealant or glue that preserved it. I've spent some time staring into it.

[shaardula]

09:24 AM on 07/10/2011

there is a ~14 century song in our parts of the world, roughly translates to -- existence is to be like the visit of a sparrow, the way it comes and sits in the yard, and just like that flies away.

about disturbing the mandala afterwards: it common practice for all mandalas. it is drawn as an invitation to a divinity, with the divinity that is invited to be hosted in the middle. once the puja is done, divinity leaves that space. to symbolize that the mandala is disturbed.

there are simpler line and dot versions of these, which are drawn every morning in front of houses. they are made of powdered grains. ants and birds clean them up, but a lot if is disturbed by daily regular movements of the people in the house, if not rain and wind. the hope is that, it was disturbed by divinity coming and going from the house.

[dil123]

10:40 AM on 07/10/2011

That is really sweet, the comings and goings of the household and the comings and goings of nature as a symbolism of the divine. I can see the beauty and the "face of the divine" in both nature and children. I can also see where making a mandela can be a spiritual experiance.

[kooldalai]

07:23 PM on 07/10/2011

That's odd that they would preserve the mandala because the process of creating it and pouring it into a body of water is to demonstrate impermanence. Saving it kinda defeats the purpose but they are beautiful.

[Sunwyn Ravenwood]

04:37 AM on 07/27/2011

For one to be preserved they would not entirely finish it, they would leave some small part undone.

The Navajoes in the U.S. are actually related (way back) to the Tibetans. They also create wonderful paintings with sand and pollen. They also destroy them except for a few for museums which are also not quite finished, some small mistakes are made here and there which do not detract from its beauty, but which prevent it from being spiritually charged.