Ahimsa Mandala
Description
Ahimsa Mandala
60"x60"x2"
Acrylic hand made paper, sand, & mixed media on canvas
Pamella Allen 2017
Ahimsa, translated from Sanskrit is "do no harm" .
In my travels I have seen the same face on a person from southern India, as from Jamaica, or Kenya, or Spain. The Ahimsa mandala is the face of peaceful meditation as an archetype. 5 years in the making, Ahimsa began as a series of memory sketch/ink drawings, followed by a series of stencils and mono prints that evolved to clay sculpture and molds to finally make over 100 hand-made paper relief sculptures that I layered and collaged onto paper and fabric with graphite and sand to complete the Ahimsa mandala. The process of paper making is an ancient one, it is one of reconstruction after deconstruction, a mirror to the cycles of life death life found in nature. The mantra here is straightforward, Ahimsa is a meditation on peace and the regenerative cycles of nature.
To create this series of mixed media paintings entitled My Mandala, I have appropriated the ritual, therapeutic and storytelling use of the mandala in indigenous cultures throughout history. To make My Mandalas, I use my own artifacts and archetypal images, the motion of repetitive form, the written word, and earth elements such as sand and soil to create a landscape grounded in the mystic of nature. The desire is to make a place of "one-ness" in the process of creating the mandala that translates to the viewer as a place of inspired peace, a place of meditation.