Glass – Pages
Thirty Metaphysical Values
Happily there are times when creative visualization, followed by creative action, brings forth into physical reality an artifact which exceeds the inspiring concept. I am fortunate to experience this joy in multiple fields of endeavor.
Several of my designs in the fields of architecture, computer science and digital art have risen to this level. However, I anticipate my greatest joy will be in the creation of kiln formed glass objects. I say this because my recent creation, ‘Thirty Transcendent Virtues’ has been most rewarding.
I met the great architect and inventor R. Buckminster Fuller while studying architecture in college. Bucky inspired me to explore spherical geometries.
Creating a single golden rhombus in fused glass is virtuous. But successfully joining thirty glass rhombus in a spherical rhombic triacontahedron is transcendent. The individual glass facetsjoin together with an embedded copper wire network to form a unique glass vessel that encompasses space, color, light, movement, texture, transparency, reflection, and radiance in a wholegreater than its parts.
Meditation upon this glass art object enables self to witness symmetry, beauty and truth beyond self.
The Thirty Verses of Vasubandhu
Vasubandhu was the author of a wonderful, short document which we refer to as The Thirty Verses of Vasubandhu (Tri sikavijñaptikarika ).
A version of this document has been translated by the famous modern-day Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thich_Nhat_Hanh). The document can be found at: http://pvom.org/ This is the Plum Village Online Monastery website, which is founded by Thich Nhat Hanh.
I was quite thrilled to eventually discover The Thirty Verses of Vasubandhu translated by Thich Nhat Hanh online.
My intuition was that the number thirty (30) had significance within Buddhism, however I discovered after lots of searching that there are very few Buddhist teachings that refer to the number thirty. I searched extensively. I performed this search because of my fascination with the Triacon which has thirty (30) faces and had an inner voice tell me that there was an important Buddhist teaching that I must learn about.
Perhaps I will make a Triacon that has each verse of the The Thirty Verses of Vasubandhu inscribed on the faces of a Triacon artwork.
Karmatetra 