TIBETAN PAINTING OF HEVAJRA 

DISTEMPER ON CLOTH

SOUTHERN TIBET

CIRCA 19TH CENTURY

IMAGE 16.75” x 28.0”: SILK BROCADE 23.5’ x 46.0”

EXHIBITED: Ithaca College Museum of Art, Ithaca, New York, Spring 1971 Lycoming College Gallery, Williamsport, Pennsylvania ,Fall 1981

DESCRIPTION: : A Thanka of Hevajra.in yab-yum with a sakti: Within a fiery aureole , Hevajra with eight heads, sixteen arms and four legs. The central head is blue, to the right red, blue, blue to the left white, blue, blue head above and the central is reddish brown. There is a third eye in all heads. The sixteen hands all hold kapalas (skulls). The hands on the right hold animals; the ones on the left hold the gods of the elements. He is in yab-yum with a sakti.who has one head and two arms. She has a karttrka (chopper) in one hand and the other is around the neck of the yab. She has one leg around his waist. His four legs are trampling on human beings. Hevajra Tibitian name is Kye-rdo-rje (Che dor-je) which translates as ‘eternal thunderbolt’. Hevajra is an Yi-dam , or tutelary divinity the rank of Buddha: each lama chooses an Yi-dam as his protector.