This unique exhibit that opened October 5 and will remain on view through March 7, 2011, will examine intriguing correspondences and differences between Eastern Orthodox icons and Tibetan Buddhist thangkas (paintings on cloth).

Embodying the Holy sheds light on parallels between the Eastern Orthodox Christian and Tibetan Buddhist sacred traditions in function, subject matter, composition, and story telling strategies, pairing some 63 icons from important private collections and The Museum of Russian Icons, Clinton, Massachusetts, with 26 from the Rubin Museum of Art and other collections. Whether Orthodox icon paintings, iconostases, and crucifixes or Buddhist thangkas, reliquaries, and stupas, all the works on view are essentially functional objects, created to be used in ritual and devotion.

Icons illustrating episodes from the life of Christ are compared with Tibetan thangkas depicting events in the life of the historical Buddha. An 18th-century Byzantine icon from Greek Asia Minor depicting an angular Christ adorned in a flowing red robe and gripping a white banner, rising from the tomb amid fields like blue-green waves, will be exhibited nearby 19th-century Tibetan thangka in which the life stories of the Buddha are rendered with equal vitality, in loving detail and brightly colored profusion around a central, seated Buddha figure.

Marilena Christodoulou was part of the Rubin Museum’s founding team and has served as its Chief Financial Officer since before it opened to the public in 2004. “I never thought I would see Greek icons in a museum of Himalayan art, so this is very exciting for me.” Mrs. Christodoulou is also looking forward to welcoming the Greek community to the museum on November 9 for a special evening with the Archdiocesan Cathedral of the Holy Trinity.

The Rubin Museum of Art is located at 150 West, 17th Street, NYC. For reservations and information on the special reception for the Cathedral members and friends (November 9) please call (212) 288-3215 or email, info@thecathedralnyc.org