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| Meditate in pure silence to still the heart |
This painting says one quiet thing, and it is the same thing the whole prayer opens with: WE ARE ONE.
I painted it in complete silence, start to finish -- following the Buddha's advice to practice noble silence for the purification of the heart and mind -- no music, no talking, only the prayer already waiting to be sealed beneath a gold disk in the center.
It is a spiral of gold turning inward to a single, silent center. Every line finds its way home to that single point.
We Are One
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| What is gold good for? It is good for sacred art! |
If this work speaks to viewers, I would be delighted to share more details.
Inquire at Cohart. A photograph can show the composition, but it cannot do what the gold does in a room.
Gold is alive. It changes as one moves, as light moves, as day moves.
The painting will look different from where one stands and from where the person beside one stands, and that difference is the whole message: two true views of one thing.
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| Cymatics reveal the waves producing form |
Many are expressions of the One, the way
countless waves are all actually the one same Sea.
My deepest hope is simple: that before thought arises, the body exhales, then, underneath that beauty, there is a kind of remembering (
sati, smrti).
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| Ekaterina Sky is an artist working in watercolor and sustainable 24K gold leaf on archival paper. She calls her practice "impact art," work where the painting and its effect on the living world are inseparable. The paintings are the center. The murals, the conversations, the stages, the trees and the book all extend outward from them. Here's a map of that reach: beyond-the-studio |
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We Are One is now available to view on Cohart or to acquire by inquiry. This is a painting with a public history: It was exhibited at Coral Gables Museum during Art Basel 2024, and it carries that provenance into whatever room it next enters. It is one of a kind, watercolor, with 24K sustainable goldleaf, the universal prayer sealed beneath the gold, and a chip to hear it aloud. It also comes with a certificate of authenticity and Earth-conscious packaging. 
And I would love to know,
Where have you felt that oneness most clearly? Reply and tell me.
With love,
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| We are all one, but this is hard to understand |
(
Ven. Thannisaro) Many Westerners, when new to Buddhism, are struck by the uncanny familiarity of what seem to be its central concepts:
nondualism,
oneness, interconnectedness, (Thich Nhat Hanh's)
interbeing,
interdependence, wholeness, transcendence of a selfish ego. But what they may not realize is that these concepts sound familiar because they are familiar. To a large extent, they come not from the Buddha's Teachings (Dharma) but from the gate of Western psychology, through which the Buddha's words have been filtered for us for decades. They draw less from the root sources of the Buddha's Dharma than from their own hidden roots in Western culture: the thought of the German
Romantics. The German Romantics may be dead and almost forgotten, but their ideas are still very much alive. Their thought has survived because they were the first to tackle the problem of how it feels to grow up in a modern society. Their analysis of the problem, together with their proposed solution, still rings true.
MoreSUTRA: A Cosmology of Oneness
Lokayatika Sutta (SN 12.48 PTS: S ii 77 CDB i 584) translated from Pali by Ven. Thanissaro Bhikkhu; edited by Dhr. Seven, Amber Larson (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly
The Buddha was once staying in
Savatthi when a
Brahmin cosmologist [1] went to see him. When he arrived, he exchanged courteous greetings, and after an exchange of friendly greetings and courtesies, he sat respectfully to one side. Sitting there, he said to the Buddha:
"Now, then, Master Gotama, does everything [2] exist?"
"'Everything exists' is the first form of cosmology, Brahmin."
"Then, Master Gotama, does everything not exist?"
"'Everything does not exist' is the second form of cosmology, Brahmin."
"Then is everything a Oneness?"
"'Everything is a Oneness' is the third form of cosmology, Brahmin."
"Then is everything manifold?"
"'Everything is manifold' is the fourth form of cosmology, Brahmin. Avoiding these two extremes, the Tathagata [the Buddha] teaches the
Dhamma [the Liberating Doctrine, in this case
Dependent Origination] down the middle:
- From ignorance as a requisite condition come formations;
- from formations as a requisite condition comes consciousness;
- from consciousness as a requisite condition comes name-and-form;
- from name-and-form as a requisite condition come the six sense bases;
- from the six sense bases as a requisite condition comes contact;
- from contact as a requisite condition comes feeling;
- from feeling as a requisite condition comes craving [3];
- from craving as a requisite condition comes clinging;
- from clinging as a requisite condition comes becoming;
- from becoming as a requisite condition comes rebirth;
- from rebirth as a requisite condition comes aging and death, disappointment, sorrow, lamentation, pain, and despair.
- Such is the origination of this entire mass of disappointment and suffering.
- "Now from the remainderless fading and cessation of ignorance comes the cessation of formations;
- from the cessation of formations comes the cessation of consciousness;
- from the cessation of consciousness comes the cessation of name-and-form;
- from the cessation of name-and-form comes the cessation of the six sense bases;
- from the cessation of the six sense bases comes the cessation of contact;
- from the cessation of contact comes the cessation of feeling;
- from the cessation of feeling comes the cessation of craving;
- from the cessation of craving comes the cessation of clinging;
- from the cessation of clinging comes the cessation of becoming;
- from the cessation of becoming comes the cessation of rebirth;
- from the cessation of rebirth comes the cessation [the end] of aging and death, disappointment, sorrow, lamentation, pain, and despair.
- Such is the cessation of this entire mass of disappointment and suffering."
"Magnificent, Master Gotama, magnificent! It is just as if a man were to set upright what had been overturned, to reveal what was hidden, to show the way to one who was lost, or to carry a lamp into the dark so that those with eyes could see forms, in that very way has Master Gotama — through many lines of reasoning — made the
Dhamma clear to me.
"I go for guidance to Master Gotama, to the Dhamma (Teaching), and to the Sangha of monastics. May Master Gotama remember me as a lay follower who has gone to him for guidance from this day forward as long as life lasts."
NOTE 1. The cosmological (lokayata) schools of thought reasoned from what they saw as the basic principles of the physical universe in formulating their teachings on how life should be lived. In modern times, they correspond to those who base their philosophies on principles drawn from the physical sciences, such as evolutionary biology or quantum physics. Although the cosmologists of proto-India at the Buddha's time differed on first principles, they tended to be unanimous in using their first principles — whatever they were — to argue for hedonism (sensual enjoyment as the highest meaning and) as the best approach to life.
NOTE 2. "Everything" may also be translated as "The All." Concerning this term, SN 35.23 says, "What is The All? Simply the eye and forms [the thing that sees and the seen], ear and sounds, nose and fragrances, tongue and flavors, body and tactile sensations, intellect and ideas [mind and mind-objects]. This is termed "The All." Anyone who would say, 'Repudiating this All, I will describe another,' if questioned on what exactly might be the grounds for this assertion, would be unable to explain and furthermore would be put to grief. Why is this? It is because it lies beyond [our] range." For more on this topic, see The Mind Like Fire Unbound, Chapter 1.
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| Is that right? Is that why? I never knew that! |
NOTE 3: This link in the causal chain of Dependent Origination, often translated "desire" (tanha, "grasping," lit. "thirst") is where the Buddha found an opportunity to unravel the trap of samsara, the Wheel of Endless Becoming (Rebirth). But in translation it has led to a great misunderstanding that the Buddha was against all desires. This misreading does not occur in the Pali (Magadhi), Sanskrit, Prakrit, and other ancient Eastern languages that distinguish between positive desires (goalsetting, ardor, intent, motivation, etc.) and the endless sensual craving (grasping, obsession, addiction) being referred to here. Any pleasant experience might become the object of craving and obsession, but even in minor degrees, it perpetuates the chain. How could it ever, even temporarily, be stopped? Not by an act of willpower or moralizing, but rather by directly seeing things as they really are (insight, knowing-and-seeing). This is achieved by anus-sati (contemplation, recollection) and sati (mindfulness, memory, bare attention). One need not will it because reality is such that when we are free, even temporarily, of the "perversions" (vipallasas), that is, the inverted views of seeing the impermanent as permanent, the disappointing as able to someday fulfill, or the impersonal as self (personal, real, independently existing, able to exist independent of an entity's constituent-factors that compose it, such as the "eternal self" that is, in fact, composed of the Five Aggregates clung to as self and not an independent phenomenon independent of those impermanent, disappointing, and impersonal constituents), or the repulsive as beautiful. The wandering ascetic Siddhartha (Siddhattha) did not make reality this way; he awakened to the truth, was thereby able to let go [of craving and clinging], and was freed from samsara, becoming the Buddha, the "Awakened One," a samma-sam-buddha or "supremely awakened complete Buddha able to effectively teach others and establish the Dhamma and Sangha in a world that has lost them.
