PEACE WITH NATURE
Urban Gallery: Neighborhood House
Salt Lake City, September, 2008
Traditionally, Prayer flags are inscribed with auspicious symbols, invocations, prayers, and mantras. Tibetan Buddhists for centuries have offered these flags for the wind to carry the beneficent vibrations across the countryside. Prayer flags are said to bring happiness, long life and prosperity to the flag giver and those in the vicinity.
In the Buddhist spirit of Giving and Receiving, it is my wish to convey that community and nature are one — that they are inseparable. You cannot have a healthy environment without a healthy community and vise versa. I hope that as we help each other in the community to be healthy, we will also nurture our environment.
Peace with Nature is a collaborative effort to explore the concept of Peace with Nature on a community level. Nurturing Nature within a local community fosters ever-widening circles of compassion for people and the natural world.
Collaborations on this project include flags painted by the children, adults, teachers, and Board of Directors of NHH, as well as, 60 children from Dilworth Elementary School and their teacher, Chris Petersen. Chris and his students asked themselves how are we a part of Nature? They decided that by their willingness to understand the opportunities, hardships, joys and sorrows or others, they would discover their own compassion, not only for each other, but also for the entire planet and all of its components and inhabitants that we call Nature.
