PRAJNA EARTH takes viewers to spectacular temples in Cambodia, Bali, and Java (photo by John Bush / Direct Pictures)
THE YATRA TRILOGY: PRAJNA EARTH (John Bush, 2005)
Asia Society
725 Park Ave. at 70th St.
Friday, April 30, free, 6:45 (free tickets available beginning at 6:00)
212-517-asia
www.journeyintobuddhism.com
www.asiasociety.org
The Asia Society’s presentation of John Bush’s Yatra Trilogy continues on April 30 with PRAJNA EARTH: JOURNEY INTO SACRED NATURE, the best of the three films that travel to sacred Buddhist locations in Southeast Asia. Screened in conjunction with the exhibition “Pilgrimage and Buddhist Art,” PRAJNA EARTH takes viewers to Cambodia, Bali, and Java, where Bush focuses more on the people, including male and female monks on pilgrimage and Balinese dancers, than he does in the other two films (DHARMA RIVER and VAJRA SKY OVER TIBET), although he also investigates some of the most remarkable spiritual structures on the face of the planet. Prajna, narrator Sharon Stone says, means “radiant wisdom,” and the places Bush visits are radiant indeed, from the amazing Angkor Wat and Angkor Tom in Cambodia to the stunning Saraswati Temple in Ubud to the massive mandala-shaped Borobudur and the breathtaking Prambanan in Java. Stone discusses various interconnected aspects of Buddhism, Hinduism, and animism, including nature, the spirit, and light and darkness, as Bush’s excellent camerawork reveals rarely seen hidden treasures, especially gorgeous interstitials that link the three primary stops. David Hykes’s harmonic chant score is supplemented with songs by Krishna Das. Bush will be on hand to introduce the free screening and will be back May 7 when the trilogy concludes with VAJRA SKY OVER TIBET (2006).