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Osmosis

Artist Statement

Osmosis The process of gradual or unconscious assimilation of ideas, knowledge, etc.
From: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/osmosis

These Mandalas reflect the search for spiritual identity within a multicultural and multi faith world. Each mandala is intuitive and exploratory in creation and reflects a 'state of being'.

When travelling in Tibet in 2011, to attend a nomad wedding of one of my former students, I collected fabrics printed with the Eight Auspicious Symbols from Tibetan Buddhist. I have blended symbols and colours from the fabric with acrylics to create the images, as well, some imagery has paper Tibetan wind horses embedded.

Three mandalas have the symbol of the deer in the centre. These mandalas were created while I was exploring themes in my Ph. D and writing Kissed by a Deer: A Tibetan Odyssey.

In the 42nd Psalm, (The Holy Bible) David describes the deer as a symbol of the soul's longing for God. He says, "As the deer pants for the water brooks, so pants my soul for You, O God" (Ps. 42:2). Deer, by nature, are extremely shy creatures, and their serene presence in a landscape represents a realm absent of fear.

In Tibetan Buddhism the gentleness and grace of the deer represent the qualities of the true renunciate, as does its lifestyle as a homeless wander never resting in the same place. Joseph Campbell (1972) describes the role of the deer in Celtic mythology as a symbol of an animal that lures the adventurer to follow them into an array of unknown landscapes, places that they have never been in before, where you find yourself not knowing what you are doing, suddenly immersed in an adventure.