Buddhist Religious Art Form Transcends Boundaries

GLOBAL TIMES
By Xu Ming

Thangka painting by Gyatso

CHINA---Though a favorite for collectors at the present, Thangka remains an obscure art beyond the Tibetan areas, not palpable to people outside the industry. An effort is being made at the Grand Hotel Beijing, where over 30 pieces of selected Thangka paintings by two artists are exhibited. Chudri and Tashi Gyatso, two brothers from Qinghai Province, learned the technique for painting Thangka, a type of religious scroll painting mounted on colorful satin and fabric and hung for worship, 30 years ago. In the past decade, Thangka has taken off rapidly, but meanwhile, the traditional religious aspects of the art are becoming secularized. [link]