The Buddhist Centre

Samādhi is the Sanskrit word for a state of peaceful, integrated absorption the mind can reach through meditation. And people’s faces in meditation have been a source of fascination (and distraction) for documentary filmmaker Hartley Woolf since he began his own Buddhist practice. “I can’t help but enjoy taking in all the different expressions around me in the shrine room,” he says, “and wondering what’s going on inside the mind behind.” Join us for a delightful conversation between an artist and some of his subjects (Bhadra, Eugene Furniss and Maitrijyoti) as we explore the beautiful intimacy of this unique art project. In the most mindful way, Hartley sets out to capture something of the mystery of meditation, expressed in the faces of a diverse set of humans trying to be present with their experience. The result is an extraordinary book of portrait photography and we are privileged to hear reflections after the fact from some of those sitting and from the artist himself. Self-consciousness and self-per