Zangmo Alexander

Letter to My Mum

Made in response to my mother asking me why I wanted to ordain as a Buddhist nun, this short video explores renunciation, materialism and gender stereotyping, with hidden agenda about my experience of mother-daughter relationship.

By Zangmo Alexander

Photographic contributions: Monty Alexander and Jacob Drummond

With thanks to Ani Pema Yeshi and Joanna Chatburn

A Buddhist nun from 2007-2014, I am grateful to have received profound teachings and life changing practices from spiritual masters in the Tibetan Buddhist traditions. Currently training in Kagyu Mahamudra as taught by Mingyur Rinpoche, I am learning to ground profound Dharma in both everyday life and art practices.

Spirituality and visual art have always been central in my life. From a Jewish-Christian background, my spiritual search eventually led me to Tibetan Buddhism in 1992. Participating in art therapy helped me realise how the arts can reach beyond purely visual and aesthetic dimensions to be deeply transforming, healing, revealing, and spiritually awakening experiences pointing to who we really are.

​Drawn to investigate ways of integrating meditation and contemporary fine art practices led me to study for a Masters in Fine Art, creating the video Letter to My Mum for my final show, following which I ordained as a Buddhist nun. Interest in my work led to being invited as a speaker for conferences and UK Channel 4 TV. Dr Mick Collins also discussed my work in his book, The Unselfish Spirit, following seeing The Stripper, a one-hour play about my life and work devised by director Dr Pema Clark, performed at the University of East Anglia, UK.

​Recently receiving a generous scholarship from Barre Center for Buddhist Studies enabled me to deepen art and Dharma studies, leading to receiving MOFSA funding for devoting more time to the year-long project Awakening Through Creativity which I am currently working on.

More on Zangmo Alexander’s work can be found on our Links page.