Verborgene Botschaft Tibetischer Thangkas / Secret Revelation of Tibetan Thangkas

– Picture Meditation and Interpretation of Lamaist Cult Paintings –

– This work is based on the John Gilmore Ford Collection –

“Secret Revelations of Tibetan Thangkas opens up new avenues of picture meditation as well as providing a guide to the iconography of the major religious paintings of Tibet.

Here for the first time a unique collection of Tibetan temple pictures, the John Gilmore Ford Collection, is made available to the general public. Over a total of sixty plates the pantheon of northern Buddhism unfolds its panorama of personified aspects of Buddhist virtues, qualities, teachings, and views of salvation.

In Tibet these thangkas served as meditational aids in the worship of the buddhas, budhisattvas, and gods of Lamaism; with their help the worshipper deepened and strengthened his sense of oneness with the holy. … As well as introducing the reader to the inconography of Tibetan art, the book provides authoritative information about the teachings and initiatory structures of Mahayana and Vajrayana Buddhism, in particular throwing light on the psychological structures recognizable behind the outward appearance of these paintings. …”