About This Artwork
The Tara Yantra is rendered in the deep blue-teal and gold palette associated with Tara, the second Mahavidya and the compassionate guide who carries the practitioner across the ocean of samsara. The upward-pointing triangle at the centre represents consciousness ascending — the practitioner being lifted across the waters by Tara's fierce compassion.
The blue-teal ground evokes the deep waters of Tara's domain. She is the goddess of the crossing, and the blue of her yantra is the colour of the water that must be traversed, spanned by the geometric bridge of her presence.
Tara as second Mahavidya
In the sequence of the ten Mahavidyas, Kali comes first and Tara second, and the order carries meaning. Kali strips away everything false, without negotiation. Tara is what arrives afterwards: the compassion that carries the practitioner across the space that stripping has opened.
Her name holds both readings at once — tara as star, the fixed point by which a traveller navigates in the dark, and tara from the root tṛ, to cross over, to ferry across. She is the one who guides and the one who carries.
The Hindu-Buddhist overlap
Hindu Tara and the Green and White Taras of Tibetan Buddhism share ancient roots, and scholars have argued the influence in both directions. The theologies differ substantially, but the essential quality is recognisably the same: compassionate rescue, offered without condition to whoever calls.
This makes Tara one of the few figures who appears with continuity across two major traditions, and her yantra is used in both Shakta Tantric and syncretic contemplative settings.
Using the yantra
The Tara Yantra is used as a contemplative focus in periods of transition — grief, illness, the aftermath of a decisive change — where the work is not to destroy anything further but to be carried through what has already happened.
The cool blue-teal palette suits meditation rooms and quiet interiors and reads well against pale walls. A dark wood or silver square frame complements the palette; the artwork is square and should be printed and framed accordingly.
What Is a Yantra?
A yantra — Sanskrit for that which holds or restrains — is a sacred geometric diagram used in the Hindu Tantric tradition as a visual form of the divine. It is not understood as a symbol standing in for a deity, but as the deity expressed in geometry. Where a murti gives the deity human form and a mantra gives the deity sound, the yantra gives the deity line, triangle, circle, petal, and enclosure.
Read from the outside inward, a yantra is built in five stages:
- Bhupura: the outermost square with T-shaped gates on four sides — the four directions, and the four entries into sacred space.
- Lotus petals: one or more rings blooming outward — the opening of consciousness in the deity's presence.
- Circles: cosmic horizon bands — wholeness, and the completion of cycles.
- Central geometry: the triangles, hexagrams, or complex arrangements specific to each deity.
- Bindu: the dimensionless central point — the deity's most concentrated presence, where individual consciousness meets the absolute.
Every yantra artwork in this collection is square. Print it in a square size and frame it in a square frame — standard square frames are widely available at IKEA, Target, Amazon, and most home stores.