Comments (0) Best Donation-Only Path to Enlightenment - 2011
Bhagavad-gita Museum
"Never was a time when I did not exist, nor you," Krishna informs a disillusioned Prince Arjuna, in the first lesson of the Bhagavad-gita. It's one thing to read that "the perishable body and the eternal soul are not the same," and quite another to eyeball the lessons via Bhagavad-gita Museum, the "world's first multimedia exhibition" dedicated to illustrating, in three dimensions, the world's oldest book. The figures' realism comes courtesy of a group of Disney sculptors who traveled to India in 1973 at the behest of His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the figurehead of Vedic (read: Hare Krishna) consciousness. Through 11 dioramas, Krishna flutters about in disguise, at the reins of the senses, on the back of a garuda — stunningly rendered and ornamented with lightning flashes, dramatic sound effects and a booming-voiced narrator who sounds eerily familiar. By donation you too can learn of "The Precarious Condition of the Embodied Soul." Closed for years, the exhibits, electronics and narrations have been refurbished but not modernized, thanks to selfless married disciples Bal Gopal and Lolita, who only hope to illuminate the notion that a self-realized soul "can break through the cycle of birth and death." 3764 Watseka Ave., Culver City. (310) 845-9333.
—Skylaire Alfvegren
