Yogini Battles Coronavirus
Mixed media on colored recycled paper
16.5 ”x 11.75”
2020

I started this drawing by looking at a catalogue photo from the “Sensuous Immortals” 1978 exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It pictures a 10th c. sandstone sculpture of a Yogini from Madhya Pradesh. This awesome Four-armed goddess sits astride a bird (very likely an owl), her feet supported by two lotus leaves with tendrils. With her two principal hands she seems to be expanding her mouth; the other two hands hold a sword and a shield. In my version she battles Coronavirus!!

Yogini is the complete form source word of the masculine yogi- and neutral/plural “yogin.” Far from being merely a gender tag to all things yogi, “Yogini” represents both a female master practitioner of Yoga, and a formal term of respect for a category of modern female spiritual teachers in eastern countries such as India, Nepal, and Tibet. In the Hindu tradition, mother is first guru and in the Yoga tradition, proper respect of Yoginis is a necessary part of the path to liberation. A Yogini is the sacred feminine force made incarnate: the goddesses of mythology as well as the ordinary human woman who is enlightened, both having exuberant passion, spiritual powers and deep insight, capable of giving birth to saints, peacemakers, and Yogis.