Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo on The Art of Visualization

A common practice in Tibetan Buddhism, visualization is using the imagination to transform our perception of reality. The power of this practice is at the heart of the exhibition The All-Knowing Buddha. (Your ticket includes a tour of the exhibition at 6:15 PM)
At the age of twenty Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo was one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Buddhist nun.With art historian Kathryn Selig Brown she explains the relationship of the rich imagery reflecting her practice at the Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery in northern India with her own process of visualization.
A book signing by Jetsunma follows the talk.

About the Speakers

Jetsunma Tenzin Palmoleft her native England for India in 1964, and at the age of twenty was one of the first Westerners to be ordained as a Buddhist nun. Vicki Mackenzie’s international bestseller Cave in the Snow chronicles her twelve years of seclusion and meditation practice in a remote cave in the Himalayas. During more than forty years of Buddhist practice, she has witnessed how women are neglected in spiritual communities and often forbidden to receive the highest teachings. Deeply concerned with the plight of Buddhist nuns, she established the Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery in 2000 in northern India. A residential and academic center, the Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery is a visionary new model for the spiritual training of young women. Jetsunma is the author of Reflections on a Mountain Lake and Into the Heart of Life. She was last on stage at the Rubin in the company of Gloria Steinem in 2011.

Kathryn Selig Brown received her undergraduate degree in art history from Dartmouth College and her doctorate in Tibetan art history from the University of Michigan in 2000. Since then she has taught at Columbia and New York University, and curated more than a dozen exhibitions of Buddhist and Hindu art for the Asia Society in New York, the Katonah Museum of Art in Katonah, NY, the Harn Museum of Art in Gainesville, FL, and the Rubin Museum of Art, where she was Curator for three years and organized the exhibition Eternal Presence: Handprints and Footprints in Asian Art. She has also produced and written for two websites of Asian Art — the Asia Society’s award-winning “Collection in Context” and the Rubin Museum’s “Exploreart”.
Image courtesy Dongyu Gatsal Ling Nunnery