TIPA Marks 51st Founding Anniversary[Thursday, 12 August 2010, 12:17 p.m.]

Gyalwang Karmapa with artistes of the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts during its 51st founding anniversary function in Dharamsala on 11 August 2010/Photo: Drubgyu Nyima

Dharamshala:
The Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts on Wednesday celebrated
fifty-one years of excellence in preserving and promoting Tibet’s
traditional theatrical arts and culture in exile. His Eminence the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa Ogyen Trinley Dorje graced the Yarkyi ceremony.In his brief address, Gyalwang Karmapa said:” Among many cultural and religious learning centres established by His Holiness the Dalai Lama after coming to exile, the Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts has become the most important centre of the preservation of Tibetan art and culture.””The
primary responsibility of TIPA is to preserve and promote the vast
repertoire of theatrical arts that has been passed from generation to
generation in Tibet. Therefore, we must express gratitude to the
institutes’ past and present members who have ceaselessly contributed
towards fulfilling His Holiness’s wishes and the good of Tibet’s
secular and religious heritage. I called on the members to continuously
make concerted efforts,” Gyalwang Karmapa added.The institute has 112 members, including artistes, instructors, administrative staff and craftsmen.His
Holiness the Dalai Lama established TIPA in August 1959 to preserve the
traditional performing arts, as every aspect of Tibetan culture and
civilisation was threatened with the Communist Chinese occupation of
Tibet.