RELATED TIBETAN SCRIPTS

Thursday 26 March 2009

Tashi's name and seal

'Karma Tsering Tashi', the name given by Kalu Rinpoche on Tashi's
ordination as a novice monk: 11th August 1984

Many ask about Tashi's personal seal, so here Tashi tells the story of how it came about:

The  Birth  of  a  seal.


Back in the days when i was a monk, one of my teachers, His Eminence Situ Rinpoche, suggested that i should have my own personal seal, explaining that since i was an artist and my pieces of work should be signed and stamped with a personal 'seal' of authentication. 
I went away and thought about this and came up with a small design of my name 'Tashi' in a Tibetan Umeh script, small round and simple, as shown above right. Presenting the design to Situ Rinpoche; he approved it and for the next few years from 1996 i used this humble little seal.

Four years later, on the date of the 9-9-99 i came up with an idea of a seal design of my Tibetan astrological birth year, being a 'Water Tiger'. The next day sitting on a very slow train from Sligo to Dublin in Ireland, i found the time to plot out a few rough sketch designs of my now water tiger seal.

My intention was to convey a young playful tiger, not too serious but with a slight angry hiss. As you can see in the above example, part of the tiger becomes the energetic swirls of the 'water' inseparable from the Tigers body, this represents  energy and creativity. 
The tiger tail is intentionally handsome, reminiscent of a healthy and thick fury tail. the tail is then curiously turns into a spring like play of design leading down to the strength of the back legs.
Marking the top of the seal, within the border is the Sun sign.

I now have several different seals, but this particular seal seems to be the most popular, it has become just as much a logo as a seal, this is especially the case with the logo used for tashimannox.com website and also heads this blog, where the tiger seal has been accompanied with my signature written in Tibetan. 



If you would like to know more about seal designs in general and would perhaps like to own a personal seal, you can commission a seal design here.


There is also a post that explains how to use a seal here.







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