Strewn about are flowers of beautiful mines of jewels
Resting in the sky through the power of ancient vows.
Over an ocean of various adornments, stable and strong.
Clouds of light spread, filling the ten directions.

In all the jewels are clouds of enlightening beings;
Traveling to all quarters, blazing with light;
Rimmed with glowing flames, beautiful flower ornaments
Circulate throughout the universe, reaching everywhere.

From all the jewels emanate pure light
Which totally illumines the ocean of all beings;
Pervading all lands in ten directions.
It frees them from the pain and turns them to enlightenment.

The Buddhas in the jewels are equal in number to all beings;
From their hair pores they emanate phantom forms;
Celestial beings, world rulers, and so on,
Including forms of all being as well as Buddhas.

———————–

Tom Wudl has focused his artistic work to visualizing the evocative texts described in the Avatamsaka Sutras. Considered one of “the most colorful and dramatic rehearsals of Buddhist teachings,” the sutras describe the sublime imagery revealed to Buddha through a heightened state of enlightenment. Of the hundred of pages in the complete manuscript of collected writings, the excerpted passage above is just a small morsel of the profundity the spills forth from every page. Since his first exhibition of these works at L.A. Louver in 2009, Wudl has remained devoted to creating drawings and paintings inspired by these centuries old Buddhist writings; and will present a new series of work at the gallery this fall including the work pictured here. 

IMAGE: Tom Wudl, Arrays of Pure Exquisite Treasures, 2014, pencil, gouache, gold powder and gum arabic on vellum, 8 ½ x 11 in. (21.6 x 27.9 cm)