He combined his doctoral degree in social anthropology with Tibetan and Buddhist studies at the University of Vienna. He conducted extensive fieldwork among Tibetan-speaking communities in Eastern and Western Nepal with a main interest in marriage systems, the role of Tibetan mountain deities for the order of local social systems and finally, about how pre-Buddhist deities found their way into monastic Buddhism. Besides publishing in scientific journals, he produced TV-documentaries on his research topics at Austrian Broadcasting Corporation (ORF). In 1995 he has started to teach at the University of Vienna and has also began his museum career as curator for the Himalayan, South-, South East Asian collections at Vienna’s “Weltmuseum” (previously known as Museum of Ethnology). He has curated several exhibitions focusing on South East Asia. Since 2018 he is director of the Weltmuseum Wien.

At the conference, he will present his experiences with the Weltmuseum’s permanent exhibition.