Grayhaven Motel Gallery

Located at 657 Elmira Rd., Ithaca

607.272.6434

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Christina Reilly: Sketches from the bhavacakra

I’m an Emmy-winning filmmaker and photographer—and an amateur artist presenting my first exhibit. This is a work in progress, much like the subject at its heart.

For years, I’ve been drawn to the ancient Buddhist image known as the bhavacakra, or Wheel of Life. It’s a densely symbolic diagram said to have been used by the Buddha himself to explain the cycles of suffering, rebirth, and liberation to everyday people. The figures within it—both grotesque and tender—represent states of mind we all pass through in our human experience.

This collection is a series of sketches, personal interpretations of those characters, created as part of my own learning and reflection. Some appear dark, even disturbing—but there is always a path forward. In the upper right corner of the original drawing, a figure gestures upward, pointing toward the moon: toward release, toward freedom. I like to think her message is simple and timeless: Let go.

These drawings are not final, nor are they meant to be authoritative. They are pieces of a longer inquiry, offered in the spirit of curiosity, impermanence, and practice.

This program is made possible in part with funds from the Statewide Community Regrant program from the New York State Council on the Arts, with the support of the office of the Governor and NYS Legislature, administered by the Community Arts Partnership of Tompkins County.