Thangkas

So ive started to become slightly obsessed with Buddhist thangkas. They are these painting depicting different things, sometimes a buddha or a tara, but my favourite ones are The Wheel of Life, Buddha's Life, and the Mandala (Kalachakra Mandala).

The picture is The Wheel of Life. The detail and craftmanship alone is amazing. It takes a master with 15 years experience around 40 hours to paint one around 60x90cm. Using a single yak hair, the add the gold paint carefully.

Looking into the paintings, there's always something to see. The Wheel of Life has a number of components, but to summarise, the six segments represent the six states of existance in life. There's the hell-like experience where I just noticed a man with a rope around his neck and another man coming at him with an axe!

There's the animal-level which I believe literally represents being an animal (reincarnation, remember) but i'd guess it might also represent humans living like animals as well, in a sort of unconcious state, perhaps,driven only but basic emotions like fear and anger. But I see no humans in that segment.

Then there's the area which I think is like greed because all the people arw fat. I heard it described as the people that are never satisfied and spend all their time consuming. I think that could translate into the capitalist West easily.

Then there's the two inter-related segments where one is the "sowing" and the other the "reaping". The people who sow are jealous of those who get to reap. I see the sowers have their bows and arrows out against the reapers. The reapers seem to have a luxurious segment, like the rich, but they have to deal with the jealously from the sowers. This diachotomy would well represent the rich versus the poor.

Then finally there is the heaven-like segment. I assume one needs to achieve enlightenment first.