Unstruck Sound Beneath the Naga
To listen without expectation—that is how stone uncloses.
Barefoot on flagstones still cool with night, I enter the cruciform heart of Angkor Wat. Incense has long ascended, yet a fragrant hush remains, draped across pillars like a prayer stalled in its first syllable. In that hush rests a single figure: the Buddha in dhyāna, nested beneath Muchilinda’s coiled hood.
His gaze bends inward, palms shaping a circle wide enough to cradle silence itself. The sandstone, polished by centuries of hands and breath, offers presence rather than weight. So I do not lift the camera. I breathe, I match the stillness.
At last a filament of dawn brushes the serpent’s brow. My shutter falls—not to seize, but to receive—medium-format film opening like a small lung, holding the unstruck sound of interior dawn.
Unstruck dawn resounds—
stone coils guard the early hush,
stillness shelters light.
Also in Library
Hands of the Sculptor — The Craft as Meditation
In the hush of the galleries, the sculptor listens rather than strikes.
Each breath, each measured blow, opens silence a little further.
Unfinished reliefs reveal the moment when mastery becomes meditation—
when patience itself is carved into being,
and the dust that falls at a mason’s feet becomes the residue of prayer.
The Asura Within
At the gates of Angkor Thom, gods and demons share a single serpent.
Across this bridge of struggle the pilgrim learns that the asura is not evil but unfinished — the restless force within each of us still grasping for light.
To cross the naga is to balance passion with compassion, struggle with stillness, shadow with dawn.
Garuda and the Serpent · Flight and Surrender
Between Garuda’s wings and the Nāga’s coils, Angkor breathes its oldest truth: flight and surrender are one motion. In the carvings where sky and water entwine, the pilgrim learns that freedom depends upon gravity, and that stillness itself is a kind of flight.
$260
"The unstruck sound"
Angkor Wat Temple, Cambodia — 2017
Limited Edition Archival Pigment Print
Edition
Strictly limited to 25 prints + 2 Artist’s Proofs
Medium
Hand-toned black-and-white archival pigment print on Hahnemühle Bamboo — a museum-grade fine art paper chosen for its quiet tactility and reverent depth, echoing the spirit of the temples.
Signature & Numbering
Each print is individually signed and numbered by the artist on the border (recto)
Certificate of Authenticity
Accompanies every print
Image Size
8 x 8 inches (20.3 x 20.3 cm)
Dawn enters the cruciform gallery like a withheld breath—soft, soundless, reverent. In that shadowed hush, a naga coils skyward to shelter the meditating Buddha, their forms echoing a pact between storm and silence.
The air still tastes of long-faded incense. Light moves as remembrance, touching stone older than vision. Beneath the serpent’s hood, the Buddha’s eyes remain half-closed—not in sleep, but in radiant listening.
I exposed a single frame on medium-format black-and-white film, trusting the patience of long exposure to honour what the eye alone cannot keep. In the darkroom, chiaroscuro deepened the tonal hush; hand-toning later revealed the muted radiance lodged within shadow.
Each print rests on museum-grade Hahnemühle Bamboo paper, hand-toned, signed, and numbered within a strictly limited edition of 25 with 2 Artist’s Proofs.
Welcome this listening stillness as a threshold within your own walls.
Click here to enter the Artist’s Journal, where the unstruck sound quietly unfolds.
Previously titled ‘Buddha I, Angkor Wat Temple, Cambodia. 2017,’ this photograph has been renamed to better reflect its place in the series and its spiritual tone. The edition, provenance, and authenticity remain unchanged.
