What Is Your Sacred Space?
The need to carve out sacred space in our lives is as pressing today as it was in time immemorial, when newborn spiritual beliefs were gently rocked in the cradles of civilization to a soft, rhythmic chanting.
Who doesn’t have a desire to slow down and reflect, surrounded by a little Himalayan inspiration from the past?
The Rubin Museum of Art knows this. It has recently devoted its entire fourth floor to Sacred Spaces, a calm, spare walkway for a changing showcase of Eastern rituals as well as a permanent setting for one of its crown jewels, the Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room. Relocated and expanded, the lushly appointed replica of a private shrine, typical of an upper class Tibetan home, is open for our contemporary contemplation.
On a perfect autumn day, I entered the open space that spins out from the dramatic circular stairwell. In the first section I was greeted by a huge reflecting bowl. A group of school children was gathered on the floor nearby, working a very low-tech interactive feature as they answered the question posed: “What is your sacred space?” For this Collected Spaces project, they were writing in pencil on pieces of white paper and folding, then depositing, them into the bowl. I glanced in and the first one that caught my eye read “My Body.” Good answer, I thought. They are all good answers, resulting from the simple act of slowing down to contemplate.
“Natural spaces, religious spaces, and states-of-mind are the [if gte vml 1]><v:shape id="_x0000_s1026" style='position:absolute;margin-left:-518pt;margin-top:349pt; width:348.1pt;height:348.1pt;z-index:251657728;mso-wrap-edited:f; mso-wrap-distance-left:12pt;mso-wrap-distance-top:12pt; mso-wrap-distance-right:12pt;mso-wrap-distance-bottom:12pt; mso-position-horizontal:absolute;mso-position-horizontal-relative:page; mso-position-vertical:absolute;mso-position-vertical-relative:page' coordsize="21600,21600" wrapcoords="-46 0 -46 21506 21600 21506 21600 0 -46 0" strokeweight="1pt"> <v:imagedata src="file://localhost/Users/ckling/Library/Caches/TemporaryItems/msoclip/0clip_image001.png" o:title=""></v:imagedata> <w:wrap type="through" anchorx="page" anchory="page"></w:wrap> </v:shape><![endif][if !vml][endif]most prevalent responses,” said Dominique Townsend, the museum’s Head of Interpretation and Innovation. From the bowl, each and every note is acknowledged—displayed in the museum or documented on their website—the interactive aspect now brought up to high tech Tumblr-feed speed.
The current exhibit’s focus is on geography as well as architectural and structural sense of space, reminding us of the sacred interaction with our environment. Continuing, I next found myself engulfed by a panoramic photograph of Lomanthang, Mustang, Nepal, taken by Jaroslav Poncar. I sat and marveled at the vista, pondering the power and beauty of nature, and understanding how Tibetan Buddhism could blossom and flourish in such a space.
What better way to get a New Yorker to slow down then to provide not one giant screen of activity, but two? In the twelve-minute looped video installation, created by Deidi von Schaewen, a once-every-twelve-years sacred rite in Shravanabelagola, Karnataka, India is documented. In this hypnotizing display, a massive stone icon of an enlightened being of the Jain religion (the tallest single-stone sculpture on earth) is anointed by devotees over the course of four days.
Intentionally spilled milk, as well as washes of pigments such as tumeric and rose petals, are poured from above by those earning their religious merits. Below, Jain monks, nude for ascetic reasons, worship at and wash the feet of the icon. (Jainism is one of the oldest religions totally devoted to nonviolence toward humans, animals, insects, and even plants. With world events ever-escalating in the opposite direction of Jainism, there is much to contemplate here.)
As I continued, I heard chanting and stopped in my tracks at the colorful and viscerally symbolic thangka, the Wheel of Life. Said to have been designed by the Buddha himself, its original purpose was to hang at the entrance of a Buddhist temple for monks and the public alike to reflect on. This one also serves as a sign marker to let us know we have arrived at the main event on this floor, the Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room.
Originally the Shrine Room was on loan from the Smithsonian, tucked around a dark corner for visitors to peek into. I recalled my earlier visit, where I felt as if I were taking a tour of a historic house, with the room roped off and a distinct separation between me and the energy of the space. The newly designed setting welcomes our presence and immersion into the experience with an extended roof and comfortable stools. I took a seat.
A warm, golden aura of abundance permeates the space, of which every nook, cranny, and inch of wall is filled with spiritual art and artifacts in an orderly and serene manner. The effect is soothing and enveloping in a very tactile way—glowing reflections on cymbals and inlaid wood, silken threads and sculptural deities, all evoking an ancient tradition of devotion in an exotic domestic setting that invites a spark to ignite in our own personal concept of a private shrine.
—Sharon Watts
