Art, Culture and Education

Diamond Way Buddhism uses Buddhist art – both statues and the Tibetan scroll paintings known as thangkas – as supports for meditation. The Buddha aspects pictured are understood to represent different aspects of enlightenment. By meditating on these fascinating forms, or even just looking at them, viewers discover and strengthen in their own minds the qualities that the statues and thangkas represent. The Diamond Way Buddhism Foundation supports a unique collection of Buddhist art from the cultures of Tibet and Nepal, which has been shown in exhibitions in the European Parliament, Innsbruck, London, Munich, Berlin, Hamburg, and many other cities.

The Foundation is participating in the construction of stupas, monuments symbolizing enlightenment, which bring freedom and peace to their surroundings.

Since 2006 in Braunschweig, Germany, recognized master statue builders have been passing on their knowledge of clay statue building to Western students. The Foundation supports this project under the guidance of the Buddhist Institute of Tibetan Art (BINTA). 

Also, the co-financing and advising of Buddhist film projects is an activity of the Foundation, per example Hannah: Buddhism's Untold Journey, a film about the life of Hannah Nydahl, late wife of Lama Ole Nydahl and main founder of the Diamond Way Buddhist Foundation.

Buddhism and science is another aspect of culture in which the Foundation helps to promote mutual understanding between East and West. By organizing symposia such as the Buddhism and Science Symposium in Munich in 2008, the insights into the nature of reality that Diamond Way Buddhism has inherited from the Buddha are brought into dialogue with the latest findings of modern science, to the mutual enrichment of everyone's understanding.

Education is an area in which the Foundation is uniquely positioned to make a positive contribution. Buddhism is still in transition to the West, and clarifying what is essential and what is cultural is very important. In Germany, the Foundation is working with the government to provide high-quality information that can be used in curricula to teach Buddhism in schools.

The Foundation supports the Karmapa International Buddhist Institute, which promotes basic Buddhist learning and teaches the ancient wisdom of Buddhism to both lay and ordained practitioners.