Biography of a Thought

This atrium, as Tenzing Rigdol notes, “has no beginning and end; it is like a mandala in itself.” Within this space the artist created an installation that tracks “the journey of a single thought that gathers momentum and produces many thoughts that cluster and form ideas.” Surrounding a central composition on interdependence is a handwoven carpet that marks the cardinal directions. This leads to four sets of paintings containing twenty-one mandalas that draw attention to issues that shape our world. Unifying his composition is a churning ocean representing emotion and clouds symbolizing fleeting thoughts. Moving clockwise from the wall at right, the imagery explores global warming, human conflict, and ideas of virtue juxtaposed against the illusory world of the digital age. Finally, as the waves quiet, we are invited to consider our relationship to the whole.

Biography of a Thought, like any mandala, takes a complex and elusive idea and pulls it apart into constituent elements. A sense of subtle or hidden content pervades the massive composition. The artist has aligned the work with tantric traditions involving deeper meanings that can only be understood by someone with special training. In an illustration of this idea, members of disability communities fluent in braille or American Sign Language (ASL) have access to certain messages throughout the composition. In the central area, for example, a repeated poetic mantra expressed on the platform in braille and encircling the painted image in a form of ASL reads:

I see the sun
I see cloud
I see river
I see soil
I see the universe
within interdependency

While drawing on Buddhist ideas, practices, and artistic formats seen in the surrounding galleries, Tenzing Rigdol’s installation presents our world from a secular perspective. Moving clockwise from left, paintings address the ecosystem and human behavior; conflict and aggression; and virtue juxtaposed with the illusory world and the digital age. On the final wall, the waves quiet, and we are invited to consider our relationship to the whole. Lines running through the sky speak to the underlying structure of Tibetan Buddhist paintings, while clouds represent thoughts and the churning ocean emotion. The repeated figure of the artist, with a cloth-wrapped head symbolizing the limits of his own understanding, guides us through the work. A carpet woven by hand, a tradition that Rigdol’s family participated in as refugees, leads to a composition at the atrium’s center that explores interdependency.