Buddhist Art

Just before moving to London and in my first six months of living here I completed two different paintings exploring Buddhist teachings.

'Without Limits' featured a blue Buddha and my own text exploring the theme of unlimited potential or the 'seed of Buddhahood' that resides in all beings. 'Worthy of Love' employed a laughing, green Buddha accompanied by text about the importance of having love and compassion for oneself.

I've had many ideas for a whole series of these paintings bouncing around in my head but inspiration has been abruptly lost and I now have a small selection of unfinished canvases not dis-similar to this:

Somewhere along the way my spark went out and I found myself just unable to keep painting as the canvas grew messy and the image in my head simply wasn't translating onto the white surface. 

Recently I found two unfinished sketches from ago. It was a particularly sunny day so I took the sketchbook outside, along with pencil crayons, pens and pencils, and set about completing them. 

'Genuine Happiness'

'Unfixated Mind'

Upon finishing the drawings I realised there was space to incorporate words. Just as with those past pieces, the words came to me without much deliberation - my own reflection of the Dharma. 

Having finished these two I felt an overwhelming desire to keep going. I wanted to do more pieces this way, to continue with the hand drawn, hand coloured process and see just where it would take me. 

I've now been working on these for nearly a month. With each new piece I find more inspiration for the next. There is a series unfolding here and I'm finding myself once again drawn to canvas. 

It feels wonderful to have a project like this to work on! My Tarot Card series and the original two Buddha paintings were completed ages ago. I've felt like my art has stagnated somewhat and as I've been working on design I find myself in front of the glow of a screen for too long during the day. It's refreshing to have a project which requires no technology in its execution. 

We shall have to see where it takes me, but for now I can say there is no end in sight.