A group of Tibetan Buddhist Monks came to the art museum on Bainbridge Island last week to create a sand mandala, and, as I photographed that process on two different days, it appeared that the monks' visit made quite an impact on my neighbors.
You see, the making of a mandala is an elaborate and fascinating process, usually taking several days… monks patiently and painstakingly funneling grains of sand through metal tubes onto the design, one color of sand, then another. The finished mandala is quite beautiful, but it is a work of art created with an unusual twist:
Once finished, the monks will brush away the sand and destroy the mandala, dramatically trying to illustrate the lesson that we human beings too often become attached to things that are not permanent; or we look for fleeting sources of contentment like wealth or possessions, traveling dead-end behavioral alleyways where lasting happiness will not be found.
The monks spent five days making the mandala; and, on the last day, a group of about 50 museum visitors gathered around the mandala as one of the monks explained the lesson behind the mandala's creation and destruction. Initially the visitors chatted among themselves, talking about what a nice day it was outside, and about where they'd go for lunch, paying (it seemed to me) only cursory attention to what the monk was saying.
Slowly, however, the visitors began to listen.
In the end, as the monks brushed away the grains of sand, the crowd was silent.
