Masterpieces of Himalayan Art at the Met Museum's Mandalas Exhibition in New York

I hope everyone had a very Happy New Year and that 2025 is off to a good start! For the past few weeks I was able to take a bit of a breather in Toronto after a very hectic travel schedule in November and December. (And by a breather, I actually needed to finish up various Asian art valuation and appraisal projects before the end of the calendar year!)

I've really been racking up the air miles the last couple of months. Since November, I visited London, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Montreal. Most of these trips were work-related to view the major Chinese art previews at Bonhams, Christie's and Sotheby's. Tokyo was to take a quick break on my way back home from Hong Kong, while Montreal was to finalize two major collections for my next spring Asian art online sale in collaboration with Heffel.

Just before Christmas, I managed to take one more flight to New York to visit the much talked-about exhibition 'Mandalas: Mapping the Buddhist Art of Tibet' at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met). This exhibition featured over a hundred masterpieces of Himalayan art from the museum's private collections and objects loaned from other institutions and private collections.

Mandala translates to 'circle' in the ancient Sanskrit language, and has been used in East Asian religions for over two thousand years. Geometric in nature, mandalas represent a microcosm of the cosmic universe, and in art, they can be in the form of two-dimensional paintings or three-dimensional sculptures. For the most part, mandalas are used to aid meditation and teachings, and often convey a certain idea, story, or deity. You can read more about the mandala from a Bidsquare blog I wrote back in 2021.

Even though mandalas were featured in the title of this Met exhibition, they were not the only type of Himalayan art that was showcased. Mandalas were used as a starting point in educating the visitors in the rich iconography of Buddhist art in the region with examples from India, Bangladesh, Kashmir, Nepal, Tibet, Mongolia and China. In addition to mandalas, there were also numerous masterpiece sculptures, thangka paintings, textiles, ritual ornaments, musical instruments and furniture.

Here are some of the highlights from this fascinating exhibition!

Image 1. Entrance to the exhibition 'Mandalas: Mapping the Buddhist Art of Tibet' at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. To the right is a 13th Century Tibetan thangka of Buddha Akshobhya.

Image 2. A Vajradhaty (Diamond Realm) mandala from the 14th Century of Central Tibet. This painting is from the Kronos Collection and depicts the 'all-knowing Buddha', Vairocana, in the middle.

Image 3. A mandala with Chakrasamvara and his consort Vajravahari from the Malla Period (c. 1100) of Nepal. This mandala is from the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Image 4a. A large 15th Century Central Tibetan mandala depicting four smaller mandalas of the Vajravali (Garland of Vajras) series. There are two central monks, and each of the other mandalas contain a figure of Vajravahari. From the Stephen and Sharon Davies Collection.

Image 3b. Detail of the mandala's two Sakya School monks surrounded by various deities.

Image 5a. A massive silk tapestry depicting Vajrabhairava, the Buddhist buffalo-faced destroyer of death. This work is from China's Yuan Dynasty (1279-1368) and part of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's collection.

Mandala 5b. Detail of the central figure Vajrabhairava with his buffalo head and multiple arms within a mandala. This deity is flanked by progressively smaller images of himself.

Image 6. A very old thangka painting of Ashtamahabhaya Tara, a young female Buddhist protector of women. This painting is from the Reting monastery of Tibet, late 12th Century, and part of the John and Berthe Ford Collection at the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore.

Image 7. A masterpiece of Buddhist sculpture, a large standing depiction of the Buddha of the Future, Maitreya from the 10th/11th Century of Western Tibet. This object is one of the Himalayan art highlights on loan from the Mr and Mrs John D Rockefeller 3rd Collection at the Asia Society, New York.

Image 8. A figure of a thousand-armed Chenrisi, a cosmic form of Avalokiteshvara, the Buddhist bodhisattva of compassion. Inscribed to the base of this 15th Century Tibetan sculpture is the date of 1430 and the artist name Sonam Gyaltsen. From the Robert H. Blumenfield Collection.

Image 9. The Buddha of the Future, Maitreiya, from the important Zanabazar School (1635-1723) of Mongolia. This sculpture is also a masterpiece of Buddhist art and from the Harvard Art Museums in Cambridge, MA.

Image 10. A 15th Century Tibetan sculpture of Rahula, the Indo-Tibetan astrological god. He instigates eclipses by devouring the sun, moon and planets. Rahula has nine heads and the body of the snake.

This is one of my favourite sculptures at the Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art, a museum I often visited when in New York. They unfortunately closed their physical gallery doors in October 2024. But, the Rubin still exists as an institution and continues to lend their important artwork to various museums and exhibitions around the world.

Image 11. A rare 17th Century Tibetan figure of Brahmarupa Mahakala. Here, the Buddhist protector taking on a more personable human form as an aecetic. From the Collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Image 12. A plaque with a cast figure of Sri Devi, the chief protector of Tibet. This object was originally from the Densatil Monastery of Central Tibet during the early 15th Century.

This important sculpted plaque is from the Mr and Mrs John D Rockefeller 3rd Collection, Asia Society, New York. It is one of my favourite Himalayan sculptures of all time and I was only able to see it once at Asia Society's legendary 'Golden Visions of Densatil: A Tibetan Buddhsit Monastery' back in 2014. We weren't allowed to take photos of the exhibition back then so it's a real treat to see this plaque once more.

Image 13. A grey schist stone figure of the crowned Buddha Shakyamuni. This figure of the historical Buddha is from the 11th Century of West Bengal and another masterpiece from the Mr and Mrs John D Rockefeller 3rd Collection, Asia Society, New York.

Image 14a. A massive silk tapestry of Manjushri the bodhisattva of wisdom, from the 17th/18th Century of China. This wonderful silk panel was probably for an Imperial shrine and contains smaller applied patches of silk to form the large figure and various designs. From the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Image 14b. Detail of the wonderful depiction of Manjushri riding a blue Buddhist lion. You can see that all the details are composite patches of individual silk cutouts.

Image 15a. A very cool painted altar chest from the 19th Century of Tibet. This lacquered wood chest is used to hold ritual vessels and can also be used as an altar table. The background features a Tibetan thangka of the Buddhist protector Palden Lhamo. The chest was donated to the Met Museum by the Kronos Collection.

Image 15b. Some of the gory details of the Tibetan altar chest with its depiction of decapitated heads, flayed skins, wild beasts and vengeful monkeys. The point of this scene is to remind Buddhist practitioners the consequences of not following the Buddhist dharma.

Image 16. By the time you read this, 'Mandalas: Mapping the Buddhist Art of Tibet' will probably be over (it runs from September 19, 2024 to January 12, 2025. However the exhibition is accompanied by a beautiful exhibition catalogue that can be found in the Met's gift shop and many online bookstores.

This exhibition catalogue has great images and detailed descriptions of the artwork showcased. Its introduction also contains a number of essays that facilitates the understanding of Himalyan Buddhist art to a general audience.

Thank you for reading this blog and looking forward to a wonderful 2025. I'll be traveling shortly with January and February trips to Vancouver, Ottawa and Montreal.  I'll be keeping everyone informed of my Asian art adventures through future website blogs and my Instagram account @anthonywuart!