Mandala Visions
James Whitney's abstract meditation: Lapis (1966)
28 Feb 2012
Lapis (1966) a film by James Whitney. Colour, sound, 16mm, 10 mins.
Along with experimental American filmmakers in the Sixties such as STAN BRAKHAGE and JORDAN BELSON, filmmaker JAMES WHITNEY sought to construct and explore film as visionary experience. Through new technologies and experimental montage, these filmmakers sought to manifest cosmological and invisible phenomena.
In Lapis (1966) American experimental filmmaker JAMES WHITNEY develops his great cosmic realisation of the potential of the mandala through this abstract and minimal film. Drawing upon meditation practice, Whitney seeks to materialise and invoke the apparition of the life force of kundalini, a state of the highest consciousness.
Text by Sophie Pinchetti.


The world reborn through a polka dot according to Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama
Ancient wisdom and messages from the plants in this song by one of the most powerful plant medicine healers of the Shipibo-Konibo tribe in the Peruvian Amazon, who was tragically murdered
Film as magical ritual: A rare portrait of Kenneth Anger
A rare undercover documentary on Papuan tribal peoples’ ongoing fight for independence
A Surreal Journey Into The Heart of Yanomami Shamanism
“There can be no Peace as long as we wage war upon our Mother, the Earth”

