Lotus Mandala With Wave And Water Ripple Pattern Coloring Page

Horizontal wave bands run across the lower third of this sheet, rippling out from beneath a layered lotus that sits on the water like a boat. Above and below the flower, ornate scrolled arches hung with small buds close off the design, giving it the look of a printed border panel rather than a free standing bloom.

The wave bands are the part to think about first. They are long and unbroken, and they will only read as water if you keep the strokes horizontal and let the value shift band by band, darker as they recede toward the flower. Coloring them in random tones turns the water into stripes and the illusion is gone.

The petals and the scrollwork are middle weight, comfortable for pencils, with only the small buds needing a finer point. Around fifty minutes for the full page.

The entire meaning attached to this flower comes from where it grows. A lotus roots in thick pond mud, pushes a stalk up through murky water, and opens a bloom that carries no trace of any of it. Every culture along its range read renewal into that and said so in their art.