LAURIE ANDERSON, BEN BOGIN, AND DOMINIQUE TOWNSEND
RECITE THE ROOT VERSES OF THE SIX BARDOS BY
KARMA LINGPA
WITH A POETRY READING BY
TSERING WANGMO DHOMPA
RECITE THE ROOT VERSES OF THE SIX BARDOS BY
KARMA LINGPA
WITH A POETRY READING BY
TSERING WANGMO DHOMPA
Sunday,
September 14, 2025
2:30pm
Doors
3pm
Event begins
Limited capacity
September 14, 2025
2:30pm
Doors
3pm
Event begins
Limited capacity
Laurie Anderson has been a student of Tibetan Buddhism and meditation for over fifty years. In 2020, she collaborated with Buddhist scholars Benjamin Bogin and Dominique Townsend on a new translation of The Root Verses of the Six Bardos, a 14th century text revealed by Buddhist tertön Karma Lingpa. They read their translation, titled “Between Birth and Death and Death and Rebirth,” with musical accompaniment by Laurie.
Introducing Laurie, Ben, and Dominique’s reading is the contemporary Tibetan poet Tsering Wangmo Dhompa, who reads a selection of her own poetry.
Ben, Dominique, and Tsering are three of the contributors to Forms of Awakening: Tibetan Art from the Jack Shear Collection (Tang Museum / Delmonico Books, 2025), a new book published by the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College, in collaboration with The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, and the Williams College Museum of Art.
This event is co-organized with the Tang Museum, and copies of the book are available for purchase.
Ben, Dominique, and Tsering are three of the contributors to Forms of Awakening: Tibetan Art from the Jack Shear Collection (Tang Museum / Delmonico Books, 2025), a new book published by the Tang Teaching Museum at Skidmore College, in collaboration with The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, and the Williams College Museum of Art.
This event is co-organized with the Tang Museum, and copies of the book are available for purchase.
Unrecorded Tibetan artist, Buddha Öpakmé in Dewachen Paradise, 18th century, distemper on cloth, 62 1/4 x 32 inches, The Tang Museum at Skidmore College, Jack Shear Collection of Tibetan Art, 2023.31.8
Spread from Forms of Awakening: Tibetan Art from the Jack Shear Collection (Tang Museum / Delmonico Books, 2025)
Laurie Anderson is one of America’s most well-known and daring creative pioneers, recognized worldwide as a groundbreaking leader in the use of technology in the arts. Known largely for her multimedia presentations, she has cast herself in roles as varied as visual artist, composer, poet, photographer, filmmaker, electronics whiz, vocalist, and instrumentalist. Anderson has toured the United States and internationally numerous times, has published six books, and her visual art has been presented in major museums throughout the United States and Europe, including the 2011 exhibition Forty-Nine Days In the Bardo at the Fabric Workshop and Museum in Philadelphia.
Benjamin Bogin is Associate Professor of Asian Studies at Skidmore College. He is a scholar of Himalayan Buddhism, writing and teaching on the intersections of biographical literature, sacred geography, and visual art in Himalayan cultures. Bogin is the author of The Illuminated Life of the Great Yolmowa (2013) and the co-editor, with Andrew Quintman, of Himalayan Passages: Tibetan and Newar Studies in Honor of Hubert Decleer (2014).
Benjamin Bogin is Associate Professor of Asian Studies at Skidmore College. He is a scholar of Himalayan Buddhism, writing and teaching on the intersections of biographical literature, sacred geography, and visual art in Himalayan cultures. Bogin is the author of The Illuminated Life of the Great Yolmowa (2013) and the co-editor, with Andrew Quintman, of Himalayan Passages: Tibetan and Newar Studies in Honor of Hubert Decleer (2014).
Dominique Townsend is Jey Tsong Khapa Chair of Tibetan Buddhism at Columbia University. Her research interests include Tibetan Buddhist cultural production, literature, aesthetics, dreams, gender, and translation. She has taught on Tibetan Buddhism and history, Asian humanities, poetics, new media, dreaming, and death. Townsend's research is rooted primarily in Classical Tibetan texts. She is the author of A Buddhist Sensibility (2021) and a co-editor, with Holley Gayley, of Longing to Awaken: Buddhist Devotion in Tibetan Poetry and Song (2024) as well as a collection of her own poems, The Weather & Our Tempers (2013).
Tsering Wangmo Dhompa is a poet and Associate Professor of English at Villanova University. She is the author of numerous books of poems, including Rules of the House (2002), In the Absent Day (2005), My Rice Tastes Like the Lake (2011), and her first full-length book A Home in Tibet (2013). Dhompa's research book A Politics of Exile was published by Columbia University Press in December 2024.
Karma Lingpa (1326–1386, Tibet) was the tertön (revealer) of the Bardo Thodol, the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead. Tradition holds that he was a reincarnation of Chokro Lü Gyeltsen, a disciple of Padmasambhava.
Tsering Wangmo Dhompa is a poet and Associate Professor of English at Villanova University. She is the author of numerous books of poems, including Rules of the House (2002), In the Absent Day (2005), My Rice Tastes Like the Lake (2011), and her first full-length book A Home in Tibet (2013). Dhompa's research book A Politics of Exile was published by Columbia University Press in December 2024.
Karma Lingpa (1326–1386, Tibet) was the tertön (revealer) of the Bardo Thodol, the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead. Tradition holds that he was a reincarnation of Chokro Lü Gyeltsen, a disciple of Padmasambhava.
Due to the age and character of the building, the space is not optimized for ADA accessibility and is located up a single flight of 20 stairs with handrails. If you have questions about access, please contact us in advance of the event, and we will make every effort to accommodate you.
