Visual Mantras: Inscription, Iconography, and the Visualization of Sacred Sound
Workshop | Vienna, 20–22 May 2026
The workshop Visual Mantras explores the visual, material, and spatial dimensions of mantra practices across South Asia and beyond. While mantras are often understood as sound, they are equally encountered as images, inscriptions, diagrams, and embodied visualizations. They appear on temple walls, in ritual textiles, on amulets and posters, and within meditative practices involving yantras, maṇḍalas, and subtle body schematics.
Bringing together scholars from religious studies, anthropology, art history, and philology, the workshop examines how mantras operate as visual media that shape ritual practice, meditative experience, and social life.
Keynote, Exhibition, and Public Events
The workshop opens on 20 May 2026 with a public keynote lecture by Kajri Jain, “Vision in the sensorium of mantras”, held in the Aula of the University of Vienna.
This is followed by the opening of the exhibition Dhun / Dhūnī – The Fires of the Name, hosted at the Department of South Asian, Tibetan and Buddhist Studies, as well as the official Launch of the OMnibus of MANTRAMS platform, the MANTRAMS project’s digital research and multimedia archive.
Dhun / Dhūnī – The Fires of the Name is a two-part installation that explores the sensory worlds of mantra through sound, fire, body, and material culture. The terms dhun and dhūnī, both derived from the Sanskrit root √dhū, evoke the resonant vibration of sacred sound and the ascetic fire that sustains yogic practice.
The central installation reimagines the five fires austerity (pañcatāpas) of Rāmānandī ascetics through a Super 8 film projection on suspended cloth, surrounded by clay vessels and accompanied by a looped soundscape of Rāma-nāma chanting. Black-and-white portraits of yogīs extend this space of austerity, foregrounding the body as a medium of mantra.
A second installation turns to the popular material culture of the Name, presenting japamālās, posters, printed mantras, textiles, and other devotional objects. Together, the two installations trace how the name of Rāma circulates between ascetic discipline and everyday devotion, moving across media, senses, and social worlds.
Both the keynote and the exhibition are open to the public.
» Dhun / Dhūnī Exhibition Poster
Participation and Registration
The workshop itself takes place in person at Hotel Regina (Rooseveltplatz 15, 1090 Vienna) and is by invitation.
For colleagues unable to attend in Vienna, selected sessions will be accessible via live streaming.
- In-person participation: by invitation only
- Online participation (streaming): registration required
- Public events (keynote & exhibition): open to all
» Registration link for streaming participation
Conceptual Focus
The workshop is organized around the following thematic clusters:
- Material and Ephemeral Forms
- Sacred Geometry and Cosmology
- Iconography and Correspondence Systems
- Inner Visualization and Subtle Bodies
- Visibility, Power, and Politics
Venues
- Hotel Regina (main workshop venue) Rooseveltplatz 15, 1090 Vienna
- University of Vienna (Campus) – Keynote (Aula)
- ISTB, University of Vienna – Exhibition Dhun / Dhūnī
Full Programm and File Sharing
The full program, including panel details and additional events, the Book of Abstracts and additional information will be made available here:
» Visual Mantras Workshop Public Sharepoint
For on-site participants, additional material and presentation slides will be made available here:
» Visual Mantras Workshop Sharepoint for Registered Participants
(No user account necessary, the password will be provided to you upon arrival!)
Organized by Task Force 3 “Materiality of Mantras” within the ERC Synergy Project MANTRAMS. Images by Borayin Larios, Field Photography in India, early 2026.