--- Received the complete empowerments and transmissions of the entire canon of Nyingma Treasure Teachings (Ka Gong Phur Sum) from Drokben Kyiuchung Lotsawa Jigdrel Yeshe Dorje Rinpoche.

--- Received the complete cycle of Treasure Teachings of Dudjom Rinpoche's present and past incarnations.

--- From Kyabje Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche, received the complete empowerments and transmissions of the Gongpa Zangtel of the Northern Treasure Teachings.

--- Received the complete teachings of the Great Terton Tulku Pema Lingpa.

--- In 1970, painted mural of the Eight Principle Manifestations of Guru Rinpoche surrounded by the Eight Knowledge Holders and the Twenty-Five Primary Disciples, as well as the Dharma Protectors and the Four Guardian Kings of the Four Directions.

--- Painted murals during the restoration of the old Bumtar Monastery.

--- Painted murals in a stupa erected to the memory of the late King of Bhutan.

--- Completed construction of a small monastery and thangka painting school in Rangbull with the encouragement of H. H. the Dalai Lama.

--- In 1986, painted murals inside Zangdok Petri Monastery, India.

--- Also in 1986, held an Exhibition of Thangka Paintings at Silpakorn University, Thailand.

--- Painted a series of nine Thangkas of Guru Rinpoche's life story at the request of Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche.

--- Painted a series of nineteen Gelugpa deities, six of which had no extant model thangkas and were painted from detailed descriptions in religious texts.

--- Exhibitions of Tibetan Buddhist Tantric Art: November 17, 1998 in Barcelona, Spain; December 14, 1998 in Paris, France; January 9, 1999 in Linsberg, Portugal, and April 29, 2000 in Hamden, CT.

As a youngster, he studied with great diligence and excelled. At the conclusion of these primary studies, he received the highest score on the exam and was given awards.

In 1959, when eleven years old, he and his family were forced to flee Tibet to Nepal and India. They spent two years in a refugee camp at the Nepalese border and then traveled on foot for 27 days to the town of Darjeeling in northeastern India.

In 1961, he joined the Central School for Tibetans and began to study English, mathematics, Indian history, science, geography and Hindi. He graduated in 1971, having completed tenth grade.

Then in accordance with the wise counsel of Kyabje Terchen Jigdrel Yeshe Dorje Dudjom Rinpoche, head of the Ancient Nyingmapa Vajrayana Sect of Tibetan Buddhism and regent of Guru Padmasambhava, Lama Tsondru enrolled in Varanasi Sanskrit University.

There he studied both Indian and Tibetan religious works, focusing particularly on the philosophical traditions of the main masters of the Nyingma School. He remained there for six years, learning with great diligence and devotion.

Speaking of this period, Lama Tsondru says "During my annual two month holiday, I patched the holes in my religious training, which had been interrupted by our escape from Tibet. I trained in ceremonial chanting, playing the cymbals, conch shell and gyaling horn, making tormas and effigies, mandala diagrams, religious dance and so on. Seven of the accomplished senior monks from my monastery in Tibet had come into exile, and from them I received the transmissions of our unbroken lineage. I was thus able to single handedly preserve and uphold all the philosophical doctrines and traditions of the earlier monastery in Tibet."

One class of handicrafts requires physical dexterity, and its principal art form is thangka painting, the production of two-dimensional images of the body, speech and mind of the Buddhas.

Even as a small child, Lama Tsondru loved to draw: "when my teacher saw my artwork on the walls of the monastery and the edges of my schoolwork (and finished scolding me), he told me that I clearly had talent and would have no trouble becoming a thangka painter if I so chose."

Continuing, "when I later came to India, I won first place in my school art competitions. I designed several greeting cards and offered them to Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche, who was delighted by my work. In 1969, he advised me to seriously pursue thangka painting, saying that my talents would be of great future benefit for the teachings of Buddhism and the general welfare of sentient beings."

Knowing that the adamantine words of such a great lama are never deceptive, the Lama began formal training as a disciple of Master Zarwa Archok, whose esteemed lineage traces back to Khyetsel Loding from Byantse in Utsang, Tibet. At the time he was widely acknowledged as the most highly skilled thangka painter in the Tibetan refugee community.

It was under his tutelage that Lama Tsondru received his first instruction in the traditional techniques of foundational diagrams and figure drawing. He trained with Master Archok over a period of three years, 1969 to 1971, in Darjeeling near the Old Ghoom Monastery.

Also in Darjeeling during that period, he studied with the distinguished master Phuntsok Zangpo and learned his specific traditional style of drawing and painting.

According to Lama Tsondru "I had a particularly wonderful opportunity during H.H. Dudjom Rinpoche's eight month teaching program in Darjeeling to study with the great Bumdrak Rinpoche of Bumtang, Bhutan, a master of rare, specialized skills and vast expertise. From him I learned the traditional methods of collecting and processing the sublime natural mineral and vegetable pigments of Tibet, as well as the complex techniques for processing gold. Since that time I have also done intensive independent training, primarily through examining a great variety of ancient thangkas in the possession of the Queen of Bhutan."

Continuing, "most importantly, however, has been the continuous personal guidance I have received from Chatral Kunpangpa Sangye Dorje Rinpoche, my spiritual protector for this and all future lives. He blesses me again and again with tremendously important yet scarcely known advice on the crucial points of thangka painting and gives me extensive, detailed instruction on the specific design and posture of each particular deity. 

Thus it is by the grace of these great learned masters that I have traveled the ancient sacred path of traditional Tibetan thangka painting."

After 1959, however, many of these great lamas, abbots and scholars fled to India as refugees and were clustered together in and around Sikkim, Darjeeling and Kalimpong. Suddenly, for the first time, they were not only readily accessible but had much leisure time, as none of them expected at that point to stay in India for very long.

Lama Tsondru remembers this as a wonderful opportunity to receive whatever religious advice, empowerments, instructions, explanations and clarifications one wished, all catered to one's own personal capacity. For a few years it was like being in a land of precious jewels.

He obtained general Buddhist teachings and many empowerments, explanations and instructions of the Ancient Clear Light Great Perfection (Dzogchen) at the feet of many celebrated masters. "Looking back, I reflect on that period as one of tremendous joy."

Darjeeling is the western door of the hidden land of Sikkim, blessed as such by Guru Padmasambhava, the great master of Uddiyana. In 1968, Darjeeling was like a paradise on earth, possessed of every imaginable virtuous quality.

It was here, from Drokben Kyiuchung Lotsawa Jigdrel Yeshe Dorje Rinpoche, compassionate incarnation of the Great Terton Dudjom Lingpa, that he received the complete empowerments and transmissions of the entire canon of Nyingma Treasure Teachings (Ka Gong Phur Sum).

Then from the brilliant master Kyabje Nyoshul Khenpo Rinpoche, he received instruction on the ngondro practices of Kunsang Lama'i Shelung and Triyik Yishin Lama.

In 1972, in Kathmandu, Nepal, amidst an assembly of more than 300 tulkus and nearly 10,000 monks gathered at Dudjom Rinpoche's Kudung Temple near the Great Stupa at Bouddhanath (Jarung Khashor), he received the complete cycle of Treasure Teachings of Dudjom Rinpoche's present and past incarnations.

In the same year in Darjeeling, he received the complete empowerments and transmissions of the three cycles of Northern Treasure Teachings (Changter Drubkor Sum) from Kyabje Taklung Tsetrul Rinpoche. Later, he received the complete empowerments and transmissions of the Gongpa Zangtel of the Northern Treasure Teachings in Drakkar Taski Ding, Sikkim.

In 1974, In Samtse, Bhutan, H.H. Dudjom Rinpoche performed an empowerment ceremony requested and sponsored by the Royal Mother of Bhutan, Queen Philntsok Chodron, in which lama Tsondru received the complete teachings of the Great Terton Tulku Pema Lingpa.

In 1971, in Namtse, Western Sikkim, he painted the murals during the restoration of the old Bumtar Monastery.

In 1974, he was invited by the Royal Family of Bhutan to paint the murals in a stupa erected to the memory of the late King, His Majesty Jigme Dorje Wangchuk of Bhutan. "At that time I was offered the position of Royal Thangka Artist, an invitation which I declined in favor of opening an art school."

By the middle of 1976, with encouragement from envoys of H.H. the Dalai Lama, he completed the construction of a small monastery and thangka painting school in Rangbull, a small town near Darjeeling, and began receiving students.

Starting in 1977, in accordance with Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche's aspirations, the Lama spent nearly three years painting the murals inside Zangdok Pelri Monastery in Kalimpong, India. The monastery, designed to replicate the three kayas, was founded by Dudjom Rinpoche and is the main seat of the entire Nyingma School of Tibetan Buddhism.

During 1982 and 1983, Lama Tsondru painted the murals in a newly constructed temple in Darjeeling, founded by the Queen of Bhutan.

Since that time he has focused mainly on painting thangkas. In 1986, at the initiative of his friend Laurie Maund from Australia, he held an exhibition at Silpakorn University in Bangkok, Thailand.

At the order of Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche, the Lama painted the entire series of Guru Rinpoche's life story (9 thangkas) according to the Pema Katang collection of historical legends, one of a vast multitude of versions of Padmasambhava's awe inspiring biography. "During my many years as his disciple, I worked tirelessly to be able to present these and a great number of other thangkas to him as offerings."

According to Lama Tsondru "I completed another series of nine thangkas depicting Guru Rinpoche's Eight Principal Manifestations and the Eighty-Four Mahasiddhas for the Queen of Bhutan.

Another time I worked with my teacher, Phuntsok Zangpo, to fill a painstakingly difficult order from abroad of the three principle Gelugpa deities painted with the five precious metals."

Then in 1992, "to fulfill the aspirations of the sublime Ancient Translation master, Kyabje Chatral Kunpangpa Sangye Dorje Rinpoche, I worked from dawn till late at night for a solid month to complete the murals in Kamey Gepheling Temple in Salbari, India.

The primary deity is a full image of the Thousand-Armed Avalokitesvara, surrounded by the five Dhyani Buddhas, the Lineage Masters, the Purification Deities, and the Dharma Protectors. The four Guardian Kings of the Four Directions are painted in the temple entranceway. This service, rendered purely as an offering to my precious root guru Chatral Rinpoche, who consecrated with Kyabje Dodrubchen Rinpoche the entire temple as soon as the murals were finished."

For a long period of time he received frequent and persistent requests jointly issued by the Palden Gyuto monks and lamas to paint a series of nineteen Gelugpa deities. At last, responding to pressure from the four head administrators who visited his home to add emphasis to their request, he agreed.

"This assignment was particularly challenging," he says, "as six of the nineteen images in the series had no extant model thangkas from which I could work. By relying solely on detailed descriptions found in the monastery's religious texts, I was able to accurately recover these otherwise extinct deity images required for meditation practices. The thangkas were received with tremendous joy and gratitude at Palden Gyuto Monastery, and I was showered with offerings. I, too, felt very happy and regard this as one of my rewarding contributions to the continuity of the sacred Buddhadharma."

"As the abbot of this monastery, I am responsible for spiritual as well as art education of the 25 students enrolled. Under my guidance, and with the help of senior students, murals and thangkas are completed to fill the many requests from other monasteries and individuals. In addition, I continue, on a daily basis, to refine my Dharma practice along with my thangka art."