RUBIN MUSEUM OF ART(HIMALAYAN) , MANHATTAN, NEW YORK..

                                          

RUBIN MUSEUM OF ART(HIMALAYAN) , MANHATTAN, NEW YORK..

Dedicated to the art and culture of the Himalayan region, the Rubin Museum was founded by the philanthropists and art collectors Donald Rubin and his wife Shelley Rubin . The couple donated all their collections of Himalayan art, and in 2004 opened the museum in a former Barney's department store downtown Manhattan. The couple also provided the museum with a $75m sustaining fund.The Rubins had started collecting art in the early 1980s and amassed a large and significant collection of Himalayan Art.

The Rubin Museum of Art is located on the 17th Street between 6th and 5th Avenue in Manhattan, New York. Visited the museum on 10th June 2022. We went by Path train across the Hudson river and got down at 14th Street. It is two minutes walk therefrom.The Museum has some of the finest collections of Buddhist art ; 

paintings, metal and clay sculptures and a meditation prayer room . The Museum is spread on six floors. The fourth floor has the dimly lit Tibetan Buddhist prayer room where paintings and murals are kept and Buddhists chant music is played to create a special aura.The healing practices space is located on the top floor . There is a Mandala Lab on 3rd floor .The fifth floor and 2nd floor are full of Himalayan art that covers Buddhist paintings ,sculptures and Bodhisattvas from Nepal, Kashmir , Tibet and Mangolia.I also saw a sculpture of Goddess Kashmira and Goddess Tara from Kashmir. The Kashmiri art practices have not only travelled to Tibet, Western Himalayas and Ladakh but more prominently to central Asia .Kashmiri sages, savants and artists carried these practices and Dharma and gave this world the Bodhi script. This gets fully confirmed after you visit The Rubin Museum. I saw Buddhist art of Mangolia alongwith some manuscript on display. Came to know deep Buddhist links of Kashmir and Mangolia.

In the healing room on top floor ,every visitor is free to write his opinion about how healing begins in the body ,mind and ultimately soul. Separate paper slips and pencils are kept for this purpose and the opinion so written is hung on a wall so that others can also read it. I noticed some wonderful opinions written by visitors.A visitor had written this:-

' Healing begins if you accept a person as he is '.

 

The museum allows photography without flash .

The restrooms of the museum have wheelchair accessibility. Apart from this, the museum  provides access to internet through its free WiFi.The CAFE SERAi  ,a restaurant on the  first floor serves coffee. tea, snacks and limited wine to visitors at reasonable rates. Self guided audio tours are also available on The Rubin , the museum 's app. The museum is closed for three days from Monday to Wednesday but remains open on all other days including Sunday. The museum timings are from 11 am to 5 pm except Friday,a day when it remains open till 10 pm.

( Avtar Mota) 

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