When visiting Tibet, you can't help but notice the beautiful Thangka paintings hanging on the altars and family altars throughout the region. These paintings are full of information about Buddhism and the worldview of Tibet. They unite the passion of religion and analysis in the depiction of geometry and rule governance. Among them, the icons and characters of Buddhist legends float in a colorful background, the background is full of complex Buddhist symbols, rotating landscapes and geometric patterns. In some people, you can see the teenage Bodhisattva Manjushri swinging a flame sword, symbolically cutting off the humanity of thought. Others portrayed the Tibetan Wheel of Life [Bhavacakra], expressing the inexhaustible process of lifelessness, suffering, death and rebirth - a cycle called reincarnation.
The name Sergey comes from the Tibetan vocabulary ' thang' meaning flat, suggesting how to create painting on a flat surface. They come in two forms: Goku [cloth] with watercolor on the canvas and gochen thangka [precious cloth scroll image] woven with silk, embroidered or sewn together.
This painting first appeared in the death of Sakyamuni Buddha [563-483 BC], and he was considered to have created Zen Buddhism. When religion spread through the Himalayas in the seventh century, it split into different orders and allowed the Nepalese, Chinese, and Kashmiri styles to influence the development of painting. The earliest use of sewing to create Thangka dates back to the thirteenth century, when weaved and embroidered images in China and presented them as gifts to the Tibetan rulers or forgotten by them. These works combine Tibetan art style with Chinese textile technology. In the fifteenth century, the first fabric, Thangkas, was made in Tibet using local "decal" techniques, often used to make nomadic and festive tents, ceremonial dance costumes and altarpieces.
Thangkas has three different functions; first, the monks transport them to help instill the religious and historical teachings of the rural population. They will depict the high-level Buddhist figures and scenes in their lives, the Wheel of Life or the Buddha himself. Thangkas was also used for dedication and as a gift to the monastery. They portray the gods as a pleading for anything. But the largest group of Thangkas is used for meditation and can be traced back to yoga Tantra practice.
The popularity of the embroidered Thangka grew gradually in the 8th and 9th centuries and spread throughout Tibetan Buddhism, such as Mongolia, Bhutan and Ladakh. Thangkas then separated from their original functions and was used in temples, family altars and processes. Most monasteries have their own sewing studios that showcase special works during the festival. Thangkas made of spliced lines are used for very large pieces because they can be spread on hillsides or on both sides of palaces and monasteries.
It takes a lot of skill and care at every stage of Thangka painting, and it takes about ten years to complete the process. Students will spend their first three years of training to learn to draw gods. Then spend two years researching and applying mineral color and pure gold techniques, and in the sixth year they research religious texts and scripts for their work. Even so, they still take five to ten years to become experts in the field.
The youngest apprentices will begin to make Thangka by special treatment of the cotton canvas base. After scraping the canvas, apply the outline. There is a need for an intricate understanding of the proportions of Buddhist philosophy and mathematics. Thangka painting is not considered a creative art, so you can't find any signatures with painters. They are image works, so all images are based on repeating patterns, and the artist's artistic freedom is limited to color combinations. Templates are drawn from past replicas, books or based on old image patterns by the owner.
The next background is the sky or the earth. Here, students learn how to grind local gemstones into bright red, dark blue and electric orange paint. A glittering gold pattern is then applied using a gold foil that is pressed into a powder. Finally, the face of God is added by the owner. Only in this way, Thangka can get "life".
When Thangkas were still used for religious purposes, they were mostly painted in the cloister. But as tourists began to travel to the Himalayas around the 1960s, painting schools and studios were created to produce works that tourists and art collectors could buy. Some of these schools are managed and sponsored by non-profit organizations to ensure the training and employment of young Tibetans. In this way, hundreds of years of tradition still exist. If you have the opportunity to visit Tibet, Thangka's kaleidoscopic color and mind bending mode is a sight not to be missed.
Article source: http://www.reachsummit.com
Orignal From: Thangka, a little bit of ancient Tibetan painting
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