Thangka Innovator
Tibetan people produce abundant cultural and artistic works sated with ethnic flavor, and thangkas are clearly some of the most popular examples. Traditionally, thangka art is Tibetan Buddhist painting on cotton, or silk appliqué, usually depicting a Buddhist deity or scene. With a history of more than 1,300 years, thangka art has gradually resulted in multiple schools with unique features, of which Manniang, ChenZher, and Karzhi are particularly strong standouts.
Born in May 1974, Tinga began to study the Karzhi School from his uncle in 1982. His uncle is Karma Delek, the 28th generation successor of the Karzhi School. Greatly influenced by Han painting, the Karzhi School features a vivid style and elegant colors. However, training to compose such gorgeous paintings is unbelievably tedious. Every day, Tinga started early in the morning and only stopped after night fell, usually more than 12 hours later. Moreover, since thangka features strong religious colors, Tinga spent his nights reading books on Tibetan Buddhism and studying sutras to deepen understandings. In general, studying thangka starts with traditional ink drawing followed by brush techniques and then studies of the proportions of different Buddhist figures. Beginners first learn by copying a close-up portrait of Buddha, an endeavor that can last up to two years. After eight years of systematic training, Tinga finished his apprenticeship and was approved to produce large-scale murals and thangkas on his own.
Soon, Tinga was receiving invitations from 13 monasteries all over Tibet to paint thangkas and murals for them, including the renowned Karma Monastery in Qamdo. For thangka painters, traveling to paint for monasteries is considered a great honor. But such travels were not easy in 1990s, when local transit remained undeveloped. Still, Tinga took the opportunity to embark on a special decade-long pilgrimage. He toured every monastery in Tibet and many Tibetan communities in other parts of China and studied the time-honored murals and thangkas held by these monasteries while learning from local cultural relic experts and archaeologists. “Some murals and thangkas were quite well preserved despite a history of several hundred years,” Tinga recalls. “I was greatly moved to see these profound works produced by our ancestors centuries ago. And during my trip, I was even more surprised to realize the depth of long-term friendship between Tibetan and Han people. For example, some figures on the murals in Drathang Monastery located in Tibet’s Shannan Prefecture are dressed in ancient Han-styled costumes.”
August 6, 2010: Tinga explains his Duo-school thangka painting to Tibetan Buddhists at Tibet Museum in Lhasa. Tibetan paintings, thangka included, incorporate many elements from Han painting, especially from the 14th Century onwards. by Kelzang Dawa/XinhuaIn 1998, Tinga chanced to see a picture of a thangka portraying Green Tara from Nepal, a female Bodhisattva associated with enlightened activity and abundance in Tibetan Buddhism. The piece, which starkly contrasts traditional Tibetan work, inspired Tinga to inject new ideas into traditional Tibetan thangka. Tinga joined several other renowned Tibetan thangka painters to create the Duo School. Compared with other traditional thangka schools, the Duo School leaves plentiful white space on scrolls, features simple composition, and absorbs features of realist traditional Chinese painting to depict scenery. More importantly, the new school features more diverse subjects, techniques, and styles. “Our aim when founding the new school was to better preserve and pass on Tibetan art,” says Tinga. “Tibet already has quite a few thangka genres. We want to further develop and promote the art, making it more diverse and appealing to more people.”
As the 29th generation successor of the Karzhi School, Tinga cares deeply about preserving and passing on thangka culture. “I learned the art the old way – basically getting it from my family members,” Tinga admits. “I don’t have much theoretical art education. Young people learning thangka painting now and those who have plans to learn the art in the future should first study core subjects, especially Tibet’s history and culture. Such knowledge will help them develop more rapidly as artists.”
Thangkas by Tinga. Sometimes called the encyclopedia of the Tibetan people, thangka now covers a wide variety of themes including politics, economy, religion, history, and social life. Tibetan Thangka Art: Diverse and Flourishing
Since emerging during the Tubo Kingdom, which existed from the 7th to 9th centuries, Tibetan thangka art has recorded a history of more than 1,300 years. Almost all traditional thangka paintings feature religious subjects. And the art was strictly passed on only within families, from father to son – only occasionally did masters instruct apprentices without a blood relationship. After the peaceful liberation of Tibet in 1951, thangka art has been well protected and has developed rapidly. Aesthetic and theoretical research on the art, documentation which hardly existed in Tibet before 1951, began to take shape and produce promising results. A multi-level modern art education system was established with the participation of institutions ranging from elementary schools to colleges, cultivating professional reserves for the art. In recent years, topics related to the paintings also expanded from religion to historical themes, everyday life, folk culture, and scenery. The works now depict a wide variety of subjects related to religion, politics, economics, history, art, and Tibetan social life.