Tashi Sangpo

Tashi Sangpo is a Tibetan Buddhist monk and self-taught conservation biologist, artist, educator and film-maker who has crisscrossed the Tibetan plateau, documenting the life history of and creating over 400 unique illustrations of birds and plants of Tibet. Known to his community as the “The Bird Lama,” Tashi Sangpo was born in Golog, Amdo and became a monk at age 13. He has been observing and drawing birds since his early teens and has won wide acclaim for painting birds individually and on traditional thangka scrolls. He especially calls on lamas to work together to inform and educate local people about the threats faced by rare bird species, such as as the Tibetan Bunting, one of the most under-documented birds in the world. In 2007, Tashi Sangpo founded the Nyanpo Yurtse Environment Protection Association, a group dedicated to conservation and public education. He is passionate about teaching the next generation to understand and care for the environment as citizen scientists. He educates others through his art, his children’s books and through his conservation films. His life-long commitment to conservation is a part of his practice of the Buddhist principle of compassion. Tashi Sangpo was a 2016 Machik Global Innovation Fellow and gave a keynote address at Machik Weekend at Fordham University in New York City.