Yama represents the end of one cycle & beginning of another. The deity Yama is wrathful to try to encourage you not to return to a previous cycle or habit. He is there to help you break the cyclical nature of existence [Skt. Samsara so that you can access the higher realm of human consciousness. He is fed up with the attachment of mankind to the Five negative afflictions [Skt. Kleashas] if pushed he has the authority to send you at your physical death to a place of ice & fire.
Rare Find : what is a Rare find?
This Yamantaka is a rare find product, The Rare Find product is an uncommon and elusive product that is difficult to find and likely the only one available for sale. Once sold, Yamantaka will be removed from the listings or marked as sold. This rarity and exclusivity make it highly sought-after by collectors and enthusiasts, offering a unique and irreplaceable addition to any collection.
Use of Real Gold
This thangka of Yamantaka has real gold painted on its surface along with other paints. This is an ancient process of decorating the thangka in Tibetan Buddhism, Here gold is ground into gold dust, which is then mixed with other undisclosed material to make it paintable on the canvas. this mixture is then mixed with transparent glue and painted on the thangka.
These sacred paintings serve as objects of contemplation, inspiration, and instruction, guiding practitioners on their spiritual path. Thangkas provide a visual gateway to the world of Tibetan Buddhism, encapsulating its rich symbolism, iconography, and spiritual concepts. With their vibrant colors, intricate patterns, and skillful craftsmanship, thangkas offer a profound visual medium for deepening one's understanding and connection to the teachings of Buddhism.
Thangkas come in various sizes, ranging from small pieces resembling Western half-length portraits to grand-scale creations spanning several meters in each dimension. While the larger thangkas are intended for temporary display during religious festivals, the majority of these artworks are designed for personal meditation or as educational aids for monastic students. The compositions of thangkas are meticulously crafted, featuring intricate details and often incorporating numerous small figures. A central deity or focal point is typically surrounded by a symmetrical arrangement of other divine beings, symbols, or narrative elements that convey profound spiritual teachings.
How is Thangka made
First, the canvas on which the painting is to be executed is laid on a wooden frame to determine the required dimensions. This canvas is an extremely finely woven cotton material, referred to in the Holy Scriptures as "Ãura Canvas".
Then the canvas is cut, hemmed and, with the use of sturdy strings, very tightly mounted in the wooden frame. Painting is carried out with the frame in an upright position, without any further rigid support or backing.
In this studio, our primary artist, who works virtually exclusively for us, applies the undercoat consisting of a mixture of chalk and glue to the canvas by hand. Other Thangka workshops have turned to mainly using industrially pre-primed canvas.
This photo shows how the canvas, after receiving its base coat followed by a second coating of bone glue, is polished and smoothed by hand with a stone to attain a perfectly smooth, featureless painting surface. Through this process the canvas becomes quite rigid, thereby providing perfect conditions to evoke very finest artistic detail and over-all superior painting quality.
Using a different Thangka, we see how, after mounting, the complete basic pattern of the respective theme is applied to the canvas.
The following picture shows the steps in creating a gold-based Thangka, such as our No PH 9, the "Holy Mount Kailash". To achieve more intensive colour, yet another prime coat, in ochre, is applied, followed by a coat of pure gold. The so-called Thangka painting gold is traditionally produced by members of the Newar people in Nepal. 24-karat gold is ground to finest powder and mixed with bone glue and water in proportions suitable for direct use in painting. Thus, the Thangka gold is not gold leaf at all! Silver can be processed and used in the same way: Mount Kailash and the surrounding peaks in our completed Thangka were not painted with white paint, rather with precious silver.
Here, the nearly completed piece has been removed from the wooden frame. Now only the very finest finishing touches remain to be added, such as compacting the gold and giving Mount Kailash its silver mantle.
K. Lama regarded his already half-finished thangka proudly
The Mount Kailash Thangka, including the black margin (which can also facilitate the fastening of a traditional brocade frame), is now complete. Only the background gold must be compacted in the places where it is later intended to exhibit a sheen.
Here we see an old ballpoint pen casing into which a specially cut agate has been fitted. The back of this semi-precious stone is slightly concave and can be used to compact gold over extensive areas of the Thangka, while the blunt point is used to lineally compact gold, thus creating a shiny effect.
In this way, through partial compaction of the gold or refraining from compaction, nearly three-dimensional effects can be achieved. The glorious sheen of gold artistically treated in this way richly rewards the beholder or meditator with a Thangka possessed of an extraordinarily aesthetic aura.
Thangka Making Video
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Iconography :
The five skulls on Yama's diadem represent the Five Negative Affliction Or poisonous Buddhsit_Art_Yamaobstacles [Skt. Kleshas] to spiritual development which are greed, hatred, delusion, jealousy & pride & the transmutation of the five afflictions into the five wisdoms. His special power to change the five troubles is indicated by the tongues of crimson flame that arise from the cranium of each skull. He is painted with a bull's head, and he straddles a blue boar which crushes a human form. In his left hand in the threatening hand position [Skt. Tarjani Mudra] Yama brandishes a skull club [Skt. Kapala Danda] also carried by Kali [Shiva] & Bhairav that symbolises "smashing the veil of ignorance" and the ultimate emptiness of all phenomena which we need to realise the highest Buddhist ideal of Great Bliss [Skt. Mahasukha], pure consciousness and love. The energy is so powerful that it is sealed with a half vajra at the top. The white silk ribbons represents his ability adapt his energy to destroy ignorance in all its forms. In his right hand he holds a rope noose [Skt. Pasha] . One end has a hook and the other a ring which representing the catching & binding of the ego, the possibility of strangulation.
His sister Yami holds a skullcap [Skt. Kapala] held at his heart in his right hand hold red rejuvenating blood of Great Bliss called Raktavarna[skt.] representing 'wisdom'. The white breast ornament represents the wheel of life [Skt. Jivan Chakra] Jivan is a Sanskrit word meaning soul. Chakra means wheel. The wheel of Life is often called the Bhavacakra. Bhava means container or receptacle in the sense of body or form. The degree of wrath & and tantric power a deity has is often measured by the quantity of flame in the aureole of flame surrounding body. Yama is surrounded by a Fire Wheel [Tib. Me-Khor] which represents his ability to annihilate anything or anyone that crosses his path, but especially the obscuration to pure conscious enlightenment of which ignorance is considered the chief poison. The fire wheel radiate as pure psychic energy whose potency is alluded to in Yama's erect penis. Nothing can withstand Yama's fire wheel. In the foreground there are the Three Skull Offerings which represent the items necessary for rebirth. The left & right skulls are traditionally mounted on three smaller skulls. The left blue blood represents semen & the right red blood fertile uterine blood with the central skull contains the offering of the five senses representing the consciousness. The five senses are 1. the heart representing touch, 2. the eyes - sight, 3. tongue - taste, 4. nose - smell & 5. ears - sound. The attached hair indicates its freshness. The offering of the five senses is key to Yama's purpose; the offering is about rebirth the beginning of something new life.
Commentary :
Yama is an ancient Vedic deity. His name comes from the root Ya meaning 'twin' in the sense of to restrain or bound. In Tibet Yama is usually Dam Can Chos rGyal, 'The Pledge Bound Dharma-King'. The later alludes to his conversion to Buddhism by Manjusri, the Bodhisattva of Wisdom in his wrathful manifestation as Yamantaka 'the Destroyer of Yama". There are three common forms of Yama that occur in Tibetan Buddhism which are called respectively the External, Internal, and Secrete Yama. This painting depicts the External or Outer form of Yama who is a Dharma protector invoked to protect devotees from mundane difficulties such as physical illness and hunger. He is the colour blue and is shown in the characteristic fierce standing pose of a protective deity with a pot belly and erect penis. He has the head of a fierce bull with sharply pointed horns and protruding blood shot eyeballs. The bull is an ancient symbol in Indic religions that is associated with Yama and death, but also can symbolize procreation. This ambivalent symbolism is understood in the Buddhist context as the overcoming of death to create eternal life. Yama is personified as a bull as a metaphor of the uncontrolled mind that one must learn to control to overcome death. In his role as lord of hell, Yama should not be confused with Western religious notions of the Devil as the embodiment of evil but as a deity given a task within the greater Buddhist cause of the salvation of all living beings. In Buddhist symbolic terms the overcoming of death by terminating the cycle of rebirth is the ultimate goal and it is Yama who serves as a transformer in that process by embodying impermanence.
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