Monk with a Camera

2014 • 90 minutes

About this movie

This 90 minute feature documentary chronicles the life and spiritual quest of Nicholas (Nicky) Vreeland, who for the past twenty-eight years has been a Tibetan Buddhist monk. The son of a United States Ambassador, grandson of legendary Vogue editor Diana Vreeland, and a photographer by trade, Nicky left his privileged life behind to follow his true calling. He moved to India, cutting his ties with society, photography, and his pleasure-filled world, to live in a monastery with no running water or electricity. There he would spend the next fourteen years studying to become a monk. Then in one of lifeʼs beautiful twists, Nicky went back to photography in order to help his fellow monks rebuild their monastery, one of the most important in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition. His journey from photographer to monk, and most recently, to the abbot of the monastery he helped rebuild form the core of the story.

Ratings and reviews

Great movie nice time line of his journey love the fact he was opened & honest about his life and why he became a monk and took us along his daily life

Its more monk and less camera