Akṣobhyavajra Maṇḍala of the Guhyasamāja-tantra

This thangka depicts a 32-deity maṇḍala of the Ārya school of the Guhyasamāja cycle In the centre with Mañjuśrī in the upper left, Vajradhara in the upper right, Mahākāla in the form of a Brahmin seer in the lower left, and Gur-gyi-mgon-po in the lower right. This maṇḍala is based on the Guhyasamāja-tantra, a scripture representative of late Tantric Buddhism, and great importance was attached to it especially in the dGe-lugs-pa school.
The design of individual parts of the maṇḍala is indicative of the style of the fourteenth to fifteenth centuries, and judging from the choice of Dharma-protecting deities at the bottom it is probably a work of Sa-skya-pa provenance. It is to be regretted that there are signs of flaking and fading in parts, but it is one of the finest early thangkas in the Hwajeong Museum's collection.