Vreeland spends his time between India and the United States, where he is the Director of Kunkhyab Thardo Ling—The Tibet Center, New York City's oldest Tibetan Buddhist center. He is also the first Westerner His Holiness the Dalai Lama appointed Abbot of a Tibetan Buddhist monastery, one of the important Tibetan government monasteries under his authority.[4][5]
Vreeland was born in Geneva, Switzerland in 1954. He also lived in Germany and Morocco before coming to live in the United States at the age of 13 when his father was assigned to the United States Mission to the United Nations.[7][8]
In 1977, Vreeland began his studies of Buddhism with Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, a Tibetan lama sent to the West in the early 1960s by the 14th Dalai Lama to introduce Tibetan culture, Buddhist religion, and philosophy. On a photographic assignment in India in 1979, Vreeland met the Dalai Lama, and was asked to photograph the Dalai Lama's first trip to North America.[10][11]
In 1985 Vreeland became a monk, joining Rato Dratsang in the Mungod Tibetan refugee settlement in the South Indian state of Karnataka, India, the "only Western person there for a long time."[12][13][14] He was awarded a Geshe degree, equivalent to a PhD, in 1998, and returned to New York to assist his teacher, Khyongla Rato Rinpoche, and to help run The Tibet Center, Kunkhyab Thardo Ling, which Rinpoche founded. He became the director of The Tibet Center in 1999.[15][16] Vreeland also helped raise the funds, in part through offering his photographs for sale, to enable Rato Dratsang to build a new monastic campus in Karnataka, India to accommodate an ever increasing monastic population.[7][17][18][19] He chronicles his daily life through photographs displayed on his website.[20][21][22]
In 2012, the Dalai Lama appointed Vreeland abbot of Rato Dratsang. Considered one of the important Tibetan Government monasteries, it is known for its emphasis on the study of Buddhist philosophy and logic.[23] He is the first Westerner to be appointed the Abbot of a Tibetan Buddhist monastery. This historic appointment symbolizes a convergence of Eastern and Western cultures within Tibetan Buddhist institutions.[24] Upon making the appointment,the Dalai Lama explained that Vreeland's
"special duty [is] to bridge Tibetan tradition and [the] Western world."[25]
An exhibition of twenty of Vreeland's images, Photos for Rato, has traveled to twelve cities around the world, and has raised funds to enable the rebuilding of Rato Monastery in India.[30][31][32]
Return to the Roof of the World, Leica Gallery, New York, NY, April 2011; Taipei, Taiwan February 2013; Palm Beach, Florida, April 2015. These were photographs taken when Vreeland accompanied Khyongla Rato Rinpoche on his return to the Dagyab district of Tibet.[33][34][35][36][37]
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