Sandhya Regmi's art exhibition "REINCARNATION OF BUDDHA" in An Binh Gallery, HCMC: Painting Exhibition entitled "REINCARNATION OF BUDDHA"

Reincarnation of Buddha (a'Wbsf] k'gh{Gd )

-Artist Sandhya Regmi

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Artist Sandhya discoursing on "Reincarnation of Buddha"

Artist Sandhya Regmi in front of her exhibition poster "Reincarnation of Buddha"

The reincarnation series of paintings have depicted the fact that elements of Buddha exist in ordinary people, and that each one is capable of marching towards the path of Enlightenment and transforming herself/himself into Buddha. In fact, the paintings portray Nepal as a source of peace, where reincarnation of Buddha has also been taking place.

While painting portraits of Buddha, Sandhya started visualizing that the elements of Buddha exist in each individual. It is just a matter of degree. Given that Buddha is a union of a particular state of mind and of action, each individual is capable of adjusting the extent of Buddha in him/her.

Buddhism is a fusion of religion and philosophy. Buddhism is a religion to the extent that it is characterized by devotional practices and rituals devotion to the Buddha or Buddhahood. However, it neither involves belief in a creator God who has control over human destiny, nor seeks to define itself by reference to a religious belief. In addition, Buddhism has been described as a philosophy, a way of life, a code of ethics, and science of mind. Its path is driven by the goal of attaining self-knowledge and freedom. A Buddha is a fully awakened being who has completely purified his mind of the three poisons of desire, aversion, and ignorance, and has ended the suffering which unawakened people experience in life.

In the series of paintings 'Reincarnation Of Buddha' Sandhya attempts to portray Buddhist monks, who have marched or are marching their ways to the path of world peace, harmony, hope, faith, freedom, leadership, knowledge, and karma yoga. What all these monks have in common is they all have the origin in Nepal, the place where Siddhartha Gautama Buddha was born. Each of them has taken different route, but each and every track merge to the same point, the point of attaining the enlightenment ('gyana'). Sandhya has portrayed 1) group of monks marching for world peace, 2) another group towards Enlightenment chanting 'Buddham Sharanam Gachhami', 3) a monk who dedicated his life for the prosperity of Nepali language and literature, 4) a Buddhist nun who has shown rays of hope to the whole world with the inner strength of determination, courage and perseverance, 5) a monk of philosophy and leadership, who throughout his life worked for the upliftment of the down-trodden of the society and 6) a monk of knowledge and wisdom in the route of Karma Yoga with the slogan 'Work is Worship' .

It is interesting to note that the 'Reincarnation' represents a group, a society and not an individual; that is why Sandhya prefers not to specify any name to these individual monk or the nun. Each Buddha is representing a group of people, a society covering a broad geography.

The message she wishes to convey through the series "Reincarnation Of Buddha" is besides Siddhartha Gautama, it is believed that other Buddhas have also existed and have come and will come in the form of human beings for the welfare of mankind and the establishment of world peace. And each Buddha is and will be an enlightened teacher as Siddhartha Gautama who shared his insights to help people overcome sufferings (the so-called "dukkha"), to eliminate ignorance (the so-called "agyana") and finally to put an end to all the sufferings and ultimately to attain the sublime state of "nirvāņa" (the so-called Mokshya), a state of extreme peace and happiness that a person achieves after he has given up all personal desires, materialism and worldly affairs. This is just one example of the reincarnation of Buddha and such reincarnation of Buddha is believed to take place in different parts of the world, in different places and in different times.

These days all over the world, campaign are going on to highlight the fact that Buddha was born in Nepal (and not in India). To enhance this very fact, Sandhya has emphasized on the topic that Buddha was not only born in Nepal but also being reincarnated in Nepal in different forms irrespective of gender and religion. This is the initiation (starting) of a real big and broad mission with a nationalistic touch and its radiations should spread far and wide to safeguard the purity of humanity. Sandhya wishes the paintings associated with it make the viewers feel warm enough to tempt the entire world to crave for such wonderful, multiple reincarnations, ultimately leading to a supreme sense of universal relief from the ever-expanding anxiety and suffering.