Tibetan Buddhism and Creativity

"In the first step of the mandala's creation, a ceremonial string is dipped into liquid chalk and plucked to form the initial lines of a design that is seven feet in diameter when completed. This blueprint is laboriously filled out with depictions of 722 Buddhist deities along with Sanskrit syllables, all drawn with multicolored sand, deposited through slender funnels meticulously tapped by the monks to release a tiny stream."

Stephen Holden introducing Werner Herzog's new documentary, "The Wheel of Time":
http://movies2.nytimes.com/2005/06/15/movies/15whee.html?pagewanted=print

Image of the composition of a Kalachakra mandala, also called the wheel of time:
http://www.amitaba.net/Immagini/India/Grandi%20eventi%20dello%20spirito/Kalachakra%20Spiti/Costruzione%20del%20Mandala%203.jpg