"The Taxonomic Mandala of Life on Earth"

"The Taxonomic Mandala of Life on Earth" was painted at Woodstock in oil on three-quarter inch plywood in 1965 and 1966 by Dion Wright. It measures twelve feet high and eight feet wide, plus a few inches for the oak frame (not shown here). All together, it weighs over 200 pounds, but disassembles into four parts, two half-frames and two half-paintings, for ease of handling.

It is an awesome accomplishment. Every basic form of Life is represented here, each in its correct evolutionary tree, time, and twig. At the center is the start of time; ascending arcs define the genetic connections as time passes and the complexity of Life grows. At the pinnacle of it all, celebrating our miraculous coevolution over time with all the other species that have existed here on Earth, poetic license allows placement of the image of Man. This deliberate biological chauvinism makes the point that the Life forms still around us have a fate that is now in our hands.

And that, simultaneously, humanity's fate is tied to theirs.

The Mandala was first shown in the Riverside Museum in New York City, in the show "USCO Down by the Riverside", a survey of "Psychedelic Art" widely covered, including a writeup in Life Magazine.

Dion took the painting from New York to California, and it participated as an intrinsic part of San Franciso's 1967 "Summer of Love". (Janis Joplin, still an unknown, sang in front of it at San Francisco State College.)

A poster, now out of print, was produced in 1969 and still graces thousands of walls throughout the world.

During the early 70's, the Mandala was exhibited at the Palace of he Legion of Honor in San Francisco, and at the College of Marin in Kentfield.

An image of The Taxonomic Mandala took a full page in the beautiful book "Mandala" (Shambala Press, 1972), which authoritativly examined the realm of mandalas historically, symbolically, artistically, and spiritually.

From San Francisco, the painting moved to the Gallery of Mystic Arts in Laguna Beach, where it was widely praised by such disparate persons as Burl Ives, my hero R. Buckminster Fuller, Timothy Leary, Ruth Forbes Sherry, Alan Watts, Khigh Alx Dhiegh, Gordon Wagner, and Allen Ginsberg. Eventually it was the only object to survive a disastrous arson fire , the scorched painting barely saved by a fireman's superhuman effort. Dion repainted the damage and mounted the Mandala at the Arizona/Sonora Desert Museum in Tucson, Arizona, where he was the staff artist.

In 1975, Dion brought his Mandala to the Sawdust Festival in Laguna Beach for display at the annual summer show. We had a jewelry booth nearby, and came to spend more and more time appreciating this extraordinary painting. It draws you in to see the detail while it pushes you out to see the patterns. You can (if you permit) become transported, caught in gratitude, wonder and awe at the reality of the incomprehensible miracle of Life on Earth. Being around this Mandala was so spiritually rewarding that we became addicted, and bought it as a gift to each other.

Dwight Morouse, a skilled fellow Sawdust woodworker, designed us a perfect two-piece laminated oak frame and we mounted the framed Mandala in a plant filled room by our studio in South Laguna. Later, we designed the Mandala into the center of our new home in Hawaii. But now our lives are again changing and we have no walls over eight feet high, so we have, at last, shipped the Mandala back to Dion to sell for us.

This incredible Mandala has very much yet to tell. It belongs where people open to its artistic, scientific, and very spiritual messages can enjoy its nourishment.

Email us if you can visualize an appropriate new setting for this arresting painting. Or, we would be equally pleased if you would talk directly to Dion Wright, who created it and has it again now, searching for its next new home.

Dion Wright has an email address, dionart@earthlink.net, and a website, dionart (from whence I lifted the images above) where you can see more of his creations.

"Taxonomic Mandala of Life on Earth" . . . . . . . . . . $ 150,000