Unique Collection of Tibetan Medical Paintings Opening at AMNH 1/25/11

Body and Spirit: Tibetan Medical Paintings, an exhibition of 64 Tibetan medical paintings (also known as tangkas) from the American Museum of Natural History's collection, opens Tuesday, January 25 in the Museum's fourth-floor Audubon Gallery, and will run through July 17, 2011. On view for the first time in a museum exhibition, these hand-painted reproductions of traditional scroll paintings provide a unique and rich illustrated history of early medical knowledge and procedures in Tibet, and are believed to be among only a handful of such sets in existence.

"The Museum's Tibetan collection, from which these paintings are taken, comprises nearly 2,800 objects, and is among the finest in the United States," said Ellen V. Futter, President of the American Museum of Natural History. "This new exhibition represents the continuation of a great artistic tradition and will offer visitors a unique and fascinating perspective on early Tibetan culture."
Each of the 64 medical paintings on display in Body and Spirit was painstakingly reproduced by hand in the late 1990s by Romio Shrestha, a Nepalese artist, and his students, who followed the Tibetan tradition of copying older paintings, basing their work on two published sets of medical tangkas likely painted in the early 1900s that were copies of the original set. The originals were created in the late 1600s to illustrate the Blue Beryl, an important commentary on the classic Tibetan medical text, The Four Tantras.
The Blue Beryl was written by Sangye Gyatso, regent to the Fifth Dalai Lama, who commissioned the original paintings for use as teaching aids in the medical school he founded in Lhasa, Tibet. The causes, diagnostic techniques, and treatments of illness, as well as human anatomy, are represented in nearly 8,000 extraordinarily detailed images painted on canvas using vegetable and mineral dyes. The fate of the original paintings is unknown; Shrestha based his work on published sources.
"Although the models for the medical paintings exhibited in this exhibition are old, these paintings were produced in the recent past by a living artist who painstakingly copied a set of old paintings that was, in turn, an exacting copy of a master's set," said Laurel Kendall, curator and chair of the Museum's Division of Anthropology. "Both the art of reproduction and the information on Tibetan medicine contained in the paintings represent conscious acts of transmission across time and space, the living work of culture."
"These paintings are a unique and unusually rich source for the history of medicine," said Laila Williamson, curator of Body and Spirit. "They illustrate centuries-old medical practices, some of which are still in use. Beyond the medical aspects, there are many intriguing, delightful scenes showing houses, landscapes, domestic life and dress in Tibet in the late 1600s."
Examples of selections on display in Body and Spirit include:
· A tree-shaped diagram offering color-coded branches that illustrates ways to treat diseases caused by an imbalance of humors. In Tibetan medicine, three "humors" are said to flow through the body and determine bodily functions-phlegm is cold and associated with the element water, bile is hot and associated with fire, and wind is either cold or neutral and associated with air;
· The origin of dreams and how they bring the sleeper either to the beautiful realm of the gods or to the ugly realm of tormented spirits; and
· A depiction of the greater elixir of rejuvenation, which according to the text on the painting will give the patient "the body of a 16-year-old with the prowess of a lion, strength of an elephant, complexion of a peacock, speed of a trained horse, and the life span of the Sun and Moon."
The Museum's Tibetan collection comprises nearly 2,800 objects, including the 79 medical paintings and close to 400 original tangkas. Seventeen paintings from the Tibetan collection are on display in the Gardner D. Stout Hall of Asian Peoples.
Body and Spirit: Tibetan Medical Paintings is curated by Laila Williamson from the Museum's Division of Anthropology together with host curator Laurel Kendall, who is curator and chair of the division. A companion catalog, Body & Spirit: Tibetan Medical Paintings (AMNH in association with University of Washington Press), is available in the Museum Shop for $29.95.
The artist, Romio Shrestha, was born in Kathmandu, Nepal. When he was six years old, two Tibetan Buddhist monks arrived at his home to announce that Shrestha was the 17th reincarnation of the master Tibetan medical painter Arniko. The monks gave Shrestha a stock of valuable art materials, explaining that he would one day form his own school of painting. Shrestha's father, who did not want his son to become a monk, sent him to Roman Catholic school. Shrestha has said that this background of mixed religious influences endowed him with a spirituality that he wants to express in visual form. Inspired by images he saw in books and in monasteries around Kathmandu, Shrestha taught himself to paint and went on to establish a school in Nepal in 1968. His paintings can be found in many of the great collections of the world including the British Museum and The Victoria and Albert Museum in London, U.K.; The Buchheim Museum in Bernried, Germany; Newark Museum in Newark, New Jersey; National Museum Moscow in Moscow, Russia; The Chester Beatty Library in Dublin, Ireland; and The Voelkerkunde Museum in Zurich, Switzerland; as well as in many private collections around the world.
The Museum is deeply grateful to Emily H. Fisher and John Alexander, whose vision and generosity supported the acquisition and conservation of this collection of Tibetan Medical Paintings.
Body and Spirit is made possible by a very generous gift from the Estate of Marian O. Naumburg.

Special Programming
In conjunction with Body and Spirit and the Museum's special exhibition Brain: The Inside Story, the Museum will be holding a special Global Weekends program, Living in America: Brain and the Tibetan Creative Mind from Tuesday, January 25 through Sunday, January 30. This unique six-day event will allow visitors to experience meditation, watch monastic dances, and learn about the latest research on Tibetan meditation's impact on the brain. Featured speakers include Richard J. Davidson, director of the Center for Investigating Healthy Minds at the Waisman Center at the University of Wisconsin, and Joseph Loizzo, director of the Nalanda Institute for Contemplative Science. Abbot Khen Rinpoche Geshe Kachen Lobzang Tsetan and seven monks from India's Tashi Lhunpo Monestary will demonstrate Tibetan arts, including the creation of a "Medicine Buddha" sand mandala.
Living in America: Brain and the Tibetan Creative Mind is made possible with public funds from the New York State City Council on the Arts, which is celebrating 50 years of building strong, creative communities in New York State's 62 counties.
Logistical advice provided by The Tibet Fund, New York, N.Y.
Support for Global Weekends is made possible, in part, by the Ford Foundation, the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, Inc., the Tolan Family, and the family of Frederick H. Leonhardt.

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