The biggest painting of Female Buddhas in the world
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The 8th exhibition!! Election Day, Sat 3 May2025 Melbourne Town Hall, 10am-4pm
The Friendship Walk procession circles the room at 1.35pm.
More pictures will be posted soon.
“Out of this world, exceptionally uplifting.” “Once in a lifetime opportunity!” “Blessed to be here” “Let there be no obstacles on everyone’s path!” “Great event to create awareness of Buddha-Dharma.”
Footage from Melbourne Town Hall – 11 May 2024 “Invoking the Powers of the 21 Taras” Soundtrack: Lama Zopa Rinpoche: Requests & Invocation accompanied by music by popstar Faye Wong
*** Watch an 8.5 minute video edited from 2024 cinematography***
In 2017, Lama Zopa Rinpoche gave Tara Institute – Melbourne’s FPMT Centre founded by Rinpoche and Lama Thupten Yeshe – a towering, 15m high 21 Taras thangka, requesting that we show it to as many people as possible. On his last visit to Bendigo, Rinpoche asked for some minor alterations, which were dutifully made by the Swiss artist, Peter Iseli.
Unfortunately, Rinpoche was not able to see those changes, as he passed away on April 13, 2023 ;-( — but you can! Watch the 8.5 minute video above… 🙂
The central Green Tara’s fabulous new face
On Saturday the 11th of May 2024, the 21 Taras Thangka was exhibited, for only the seventh time, as part of the VESAK festival celebrating the Buddha’s birth, full awakening and passing. The sheer scale of this 4-storeys-high painting creates a very moving experience. Some visitors are moved to tears. Others stay all day in Melbourne Town Hall, gazing and absorbing the power and meaning of all the different Taras, as provided in the video.
We hope to repeat the experience in 2026. Keep Saturdays in May, often the day before Mothers Day, flexible! Neither pictures nor footage do justice to the impact of being in the presence of Peter Iseli’s extraordinary 21 Taras Thangka.
Gaze at a visual shortcut to inner peace… A giant blast of positive power! BIG LOVE!
The 21 Taras Thangka presents ancient sacred geometry that quiets the mind just by looking at it. Images of deities are a valuable tool for those of us who find meditation difficult… Gaze at beauty, strength and fearlessness. Take a shortcut to a calm mind in an agitated world.
Lama ZopaRinpoche says it will bless animals and humans, so it is open to anyone of any belief or any way of life.
“So now, anybody believer or not believer, just seeing statue of Buddha, painting of Buddha, creates far more great merit than somebody making offerings of universes filled with jewels…. Secondly, it is a female. Female. Women liberated. Exactly what is needed.”
Lama Zopa Rinpoche (1945-2023) Photographer: Lobsang Sherab; 2021
“This is a way to leave imprints for all the people [who see it], …for enlightenment.” —Lama Zopa Rinpoche
“OM TARE TUTTARE TURE SOHA”
‘Just as all past Buddhas have been liberated, may I be liberated from discontent, from fears, external dangers, internal delusions and confusion! May this meaning take root in my mind!’ (Translation of the Sanskrit mantra of Green Tara)
A ‘thangka’ is a visual image of the perfectly developed heart and mind which, to Buddhists, is the innate potential of every living being. Thangkas are sometimes sewn and embroidered and most are framed in brocade. Giant thangkas are traditionally displayed for special occasions and at huge gatherings.This vast thangka of the 21 Taras was commissioned by Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and painted in acrylic on canvas by a highly respected Swiss artist trained in the Tibetan tradition, Peter Iseli.
Who are the 21 Taras?
Tara is the supreme female energy. She is Guan Yin, the Madonna, the mother of all the Buddhas! She is beautiful, strong, fearless; she makes our good qualities bloom and brings both worldly success and spiritual progress. She is the true WonderWoman!
The 21 Taras symbolise the various different qualities of her holy body, speech and mind, and the “Praises to the Twenty-One Taras”, the golden verses painted onto the thangka, express those marvellous qualities and pay homage to them.
Each of the 21 Taras has a special power to help us: to grant long life, prosperity, relationship harmony, to protect us from jealousy, anger, sickness and troublemakers.
Tara is a meditational deity upon whom all the holy beings of the past relied; the great Indian masters of the past, such as Atisha, the great Kadampa masters of Tibet, Lama Tsongkhapa, and all the lineage gurus of the four Tibetan traditions. See our Tara the Liberator page for more information.
This 21 Taras Thangka is 15 metres high and 9.5 metres wide!
Even when it is rolled up, the thangka can only be transported on the back of a semi-trailer. Here you see it about to be taken away from Tara Institute in Brighton…
It is taller than a 4 storey building, so standing in front of it, you will certainly appreciate why it took the artist, Peter Iseli, so many years to paint it! Below is an artist’s impression of the size of the thangka, compared with that of a suburban home…
