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Seta Manoukian | |
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| Born | Seta Manoukian 1945 (age 79–80) Beirut, Lebanon |
| Nationality | Lebanese |
| Known for | artist/painter |
Seta Manoukian (born 1945) is a Lebanese painter of Armenian descent. [1]
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Seta Manoukian was born into a family of Armenian origin in Beirut in 1945. Although she is not part of the generation that experienced the genocide, she belongs to the Armenian diaspora. At seventeen, she won first prize in a art show, consisting of a three month scholarship to Perugia courtesy of the Italian Embassy in Beirut. Later on, she graduated from the accademia Di Belle Arti in Rome. Upon her return, she became a rising figure on the burgeoning Beirut scene. For two decades she created some of the most singular and striking paintings ever seen in Lebanon.
In 1975, the civil war broke out in Lebanon just as Seta began teaching at the Lebanese University in Beirut. She started to teach painting to children in deprived neighborhoods in Beirut; Lebanese Children And The War was published by Dar Al Farabi publishers, and Tache Rouge et Blue by the League for Lebanese Women's Rights.
In 1985, she moved to Los Angeles, California, where she continued her work as an artist.
In 2000, she joined a Buddhist Theravada Temple in Los Angeles, and in 2005 was ordained as a Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka. The name Mother Sela was given to her by her teacher Pemasiri Hamdruo. She stayed in Sri Lanka in a retreat center for 10 month, and in 2006 lived in south India near Bangalore for a year and half.
In 2007, she met Lama Chodak Gyatso Nubpa Rimpoche from the Nyingma tradition of Tibetan Buddhism in Los Angeles. Rimpoche as her root Lama gave her the name Ani Pema Tsultrim Drolma. The retreat center Pema Dawa is in Tehachapi, California, where she still often goes for retreats.
In 2016, Seta Manoukian as Ani Pema Drolma was ready to paint again, after ten years of full devotion to Buddhist teachings and practice.
