Capturing a living likeness

by Lisa Sofman and Jaffa Elias
It was monsoon season when Kyabje Ling Rinpoche died. When sculptor Lisa Sofman was asked to create a statue in his likeness over his embalmed body, little did she know it would take her three years, fighting the wet, the dry, and mildew before it was completed. The lifelike image became the object of many pilgrimages and, today, it lives on in His Holiness the Dalai Lama's palace.

Sculptor Lisa Sofman with the clay prototype for the statue of Kyabje Ling Rinpoche. Kyabje Ling Rinpoche passed away in Dharamsala, India on Christmas day, 1983. He was eighty-one. His Holiness the Dalai Lama said he had immeasurable qualities. Excelling in scholarship he received the lharampa geshe degree and in turn became the discipline master, lama umzay and junior abbot of Gyuto Upper Tantric College. After assisting His Holiness the Dalai Lama in debate, he became his Junior Tutor, then his Senior Tutor. He died during his term as the 97th Ganden Tripa, Tsong Khapa's throne holder.

Kyabje Ling Rinpoche's body, His Holiness divined, should be embalmed rather than cremated. Ling RinpocheEmbalming has been a tradition with the throne holders since the lineage's founder Je Tsong Khapa was embalmed in the thirteenth century. Western techniques, His Holiness added, should be employed alongside those traditionally used in preserving the body.

While Kyabje Ling Rinpoche sat in meditative equipoise following his passing, Lisa Sofman, an American sculptor and Buddhist student living in Dharamsala, was approached by those representing his affairs. The monsoon season in India was unsuited to preserving a body, unlike Tibet's dry climate. As a Western sculptor, did she have any ideas ...?

This article can be read in its entirety in Mandala
About Us | Subscribe | FPMT | Privacy & Security | Contact Us | ©2008 Mandala Magazine