Museum of Sacred Art Foundation

The Museum Of Sacred Art is an international visual arts initiative. It is a Belgian foundation based in Brussels dedicated to support and promote spiritual art and artists from India as well as art and artists of the Hare Krishna Movement / ISKCON. It also supports and promotes sacred art in general. It strives to promote social cohesion and interfaith dialogue through the visual arts by: organizing exhibits, producing catalogs, books and films, organizing conferences-workshops- residencies. It has branches in the Belgian Ardennes at the Radhadesh community and in beautiful Tuscany in Italy at Villa Vrindavan as well as sunny Tenerife at the ISKCON Center in Playa de las Americas.

The Museum of Sacred Art- MOSA is a well known visual arts foundation based in Brussels. It collaborates with several important Art Museums and Cultural Centres in Europe and beyond. It presents its collections and other temporary exhibits in its Galleries in ISKCON-Radhadesh-Belgium, ISKCON-Villa Vrindavan-Italy, ISKCON-Tenerife, MOSA Gallery in Bonazza Tuscany-Italy and in its Gallery in Brussels. MOSA possesses, possibly, the largest collection of non classical Spiritual and Devotional Art from India and ISKCON in Europe.

  • To support and promote Indian Sacred/Spiritual Art and Artists (Contemporary, Modern, Traditional, Tribal) in Belgium, Europe and the World.
  • To support and promote ISKCON (Hare Krishna Movement) Art and Artists in Belgium, Europe and the World.
  • To promote Interfaith Dialogue and Social Inclusion through the Visual Arts by supporting and promoting Sacred Art and Artists from different Spiritual Traditions.
  • To create and maintain an important collection of works by artists from India doing Sacred Art (contemporary, modern, traditional, tribal).
  • To create and maintain an important collection of works by ISKCON artists.
  • To establish the Museum of Sacred Art/MOSA with several branches throughout Europe and the World for presenting the different collections of the Foundation as well as exhibits on loan.
    To organise exhibits in established Museums and Cultural Centres throughout Belgium, Europe and the World as well as at MOSA Galleries.
  • To produce well researched publications, films, etc on individual artists as well as on specific themes or groups of artists and keep a reference library of Art books, Catalogues and Magazines on Indian, ISKCON and Other Spiritual Art.
    To organise seminars, conferences, workshops and residencies on Sacred Art by renowned Indian, ISKCON and other artists, curators, art historians, etc.
  • To establish and maintain relationships, cooperation, exchanges with Museums, Foundations, Cultural Centres, Governments and other Institutions doing similar work or interested in the work the Foundation is doing.
  • To produce merchandising from the artwork of the different Collections like calendars, postcards, posters, puzzles, etc.
  • To seek grants, donations, sponsorships to be able to carry out the Mission and Goals of the Foundation.
    To create an Advisory Board of distinguished scholars, art collectors, artists, art historians, etc to help develop the Vision and Goals of the Foundation.
  • To create and maintain a website and social media presence.
  • To loan Artworks from the ISKCON Art Collection to selected ISKCON Temples for Temple Rooms and important public spaces.
  • To organise exhibits on loan by artists doing sacred/spiritual art.
  • To cooperate with other initiatives supporting and promoting sacred/spiritual art and artists in order to increase interfaith dialogue and social cohesion.
  • And any other activities that will help carry forward the goals of the Foundation.

The Museum of Sacred Art started as a humble initiative to present spiritual traditional art from India to the visitors to Radhadesh. Radhadesh is a well known ISKCON Temple and Tourist Attraction in the Belgian Ardennes which attracts over 40,000 visitors every year. Besides offering a guided tour of the Castle and Temple and the possibility to visit the Bakery, Boutique, Cafeteria/Restaurant, Gardens, Forests, etc the idea to create a space to present the visual arts from India that showcase the richness of the Spiritual Tradition to which ISKCON belongs to emerged. In 2010 the Museum opened its doors to the public and since then the project has grown in many different ways:

The original collection of Living Traditional Arts from India expanded to include more artists, schools, etc.

Also a very important collection of Contemporary and Modern Art from India focused on the Spiritual emerged called Forms of Devotion-The Spiritual in Indian Art which includes over 200 artists and almost 500 works of art. This Collection was presented in the form of an exhibit in Delhi, Bangkok, Shanghai, Madrid and Valladolid. A major book of two volumes was produced with Nyogi Publishers as well as a major documentary with Director Goutam Ghose.

Besides these 2 very important collections MOSA has a major collection of ISKCON Art and Artists and is preparing a major publication called Windows to the Spiritual World which showcases the Art of the Hare Krishna Movement since its beginings in New York city in 1966 till the present day.

MOSA also has several collections of individual artists like Mahaveer Swami, Parameshvara Raju, Raghupati Bhatt, Shobha Broota, Seema Kohli, Om Prakash Sharma, Divine Portraiture ( Manivelu, Drdha Vrata Gorrick, Manish Verma, Srinivas Reddy), Kamal Ahmed, Bharti dayal, Incredible India ( Shakti ), Jayant Silva etc as well as several artists from the Hare Krishna movement such as Param Tomanec, Anuradha Dasi, Fater Barna, Prasanta Dasa, Yashoda Dulal, Kim Waters, Annapurna dasi etc.

Martin Gurvich

Director

Martin Gurvich is a passionate arts connoisseur and son of well-known artist Jose Gurvich and Julia Anorga. He is ISKCON’s Communications Director for Europe, President of the Hindu Forum of Belgium, President of the Museum of Sacred Art Foundation based in Belgium. He is also President of the Jose Gurvich Foundation that runs the Gurvich Museum.

Sushma Bahl

Curator

Sushma K. Bahl MBE, is an independent arts consultant, writer, and curator of cultural projects. She has organised many exhibitions on Indian art in several countries and besides having edited, written, and contributed to several books on art and artists like Thota Vaikuntam, Paresh Maity, Satish Gupta, and Shuvaprasanna.

Rogier Vrieling

Designer / editor

Rogier joined the Bhaktivedanta Book Trust (BBT) in 1998 after finishing a master’s degree in literary theory at VU Amsterdam. He translated the “Bhagavad-gita As It Is” and several other BBT books into Dutch, has been involved in producing books and other publications in various African languages for BBT Africa, and was recently involved in the layout of the “Astonishing Bhagavad-gita,” the largest sacred text in the world (on display in Delhi, India). In addition to his BBT services, in 2020 he accepted a position as an editor and catalogue designer at the Museum of Sacred Art (MOSA). He lives in Radhadesh, Belgium, with his wife and two sons.

Dario Knez

Website management

Playfully, one colleague, introduced Dario Knez (BTh, MSc IT, MBA, DBA cand.) with 4A: Alternative – Academic – Artistic – Admin not knowing that could be very close to Dario’s desired positioning between the world of theory and practice. For MOSA Dario manages the website. He is based in Radhadesh, and is a computer scientist, and he does website administration as a hobby and a love for his primary profession.  His personal interest is in integrating spirituality and business. For this reason, he is maintaining the Conscious Manager website (www.conscious-manager.com).