Murals of Tibet took its author ten years to research and compile
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A book costing ten thousand euros has been revealed at the Rietberg Museum in Zurich, Switzerland.
Thomas Laird spent a decade living among Tibetan yak herders, farmers and monks. He was in search of fresco masterpieces from Buddhist temples and monasteries, many of them never seen before, some on the verge of crumbling and being lost forever. The result is Murals of Tibet, 500 pages of lush prints, weighing 23kg.
"I saw them as great treasures and I want to be certain that the rest of the world could see them," explained the writer and photographer Thomas Laird. "And then I want to be certain that future generations could see what we see, now. And so, I felt I had to take responsibility for this. This is not a book. This is not even a book for the living. This is a book for future generations. This is an archive in a box."
The Dalai Lama signed and blessed all copies - some of the first lessons for the Buddhist spiritual leader came from the murals before he could even read. The book will be published by Taschen.