Mindfulness Meditation · Openness
This week’s meditation session is led by Kimberly Brown and the theme is Openness. The guided meditation begins at 9:55.
Bodhisattva Maitreya; Tibet or China; 17th - 18th century; Pigments on cloth; 58 1/2 × 32 1/2 in. (estimated); Rubin Museum of Art; Rubin Museum of Himalayan Art, Gift of Shelley and Donald Rubin; C2006.66.34
This painting is an unusual combination of Tibetan and Chinese imagery and painting techniques. The central figure, the bodhisattva and future Buddha Maitreya, is marked by his traditional Tibetan Buddhist iconographic attributes: he is red, has a stupa in his crown, and holds a blossoming branch with a vase on top. However, the watery grotto and bamboo backdrop is closely associated with Chinese paintings of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara. The main figure can nonetheless be identified as Maitreya through the surrounding narrative scenes. The scene in the upper-right corner depicts the story of the sage Kashyapa passing on a robe to Maitreya, symbolic of the transmission of the Buddha’s teachings.
The background reflects that the artists had a good grasp of Chinese landscape painting, with layers of ink and specialized brush techniques. A number of the figures follow Chinese conventions of hair and dress. However, color notations in Tibetan script visible under the pigment layers throughout the composition suggest the hands of Tibetan artists at work.
Kimberly Brown is a meditation teacher and author. She leads classes and retreats that emphasize the power of compassion and kindness meditation to reconnect us to ourselves and others. Her teachings provide an approachable pathway to personal and collective well-being through effective and modern techniques based on traditional practices. She studies in both the Tibetan and Insight schools of Buddhism and is a certified mindfulness instructor. Her book Navigating Grief and Loss: 25 Buddhist Practices to Keep Your Heart Open to Yourself and Others was published in 2022, and an updated edition of Steady, Calm, and Brave was released in 2023. Both are published by Prometheus Books.
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