Tsha Tsha

Clay molded miniature Buddhist images, precious treasures left by Tibetan ancestors, are called tsha tsha in Tibetan, and represent a typical and classic form of artistic expression in Tibetan Buddhism. Because of the Tibetans' artistic talents and deep devotion to their religion, tsha tsha is a rare inheritance to the world and an irreplaceable treasure of human civilization.

Tsha tsha, a Tibetan transliteration of the Sanskrit word, is the clay votive tablet (designating the fulfillment of a vow) in Tibetan Buddhism. Such tablets are made of clay and earth mixed with the bone ash of late Lamas.

Whether they are the relief images made from a one-sided mold or are round stupas (domed Buddha shrines) completed by a two-sided mold, all of them are called tsha tsha.

Tibetan monks and common people make tsha tsha to accumulate Buddhist merit. The completed tablet is mainly used to fill the inner shrines of bigger stupas or statues. Tsha tshas are also used to dispel illness or pray for good luck. When they are in use, Tsha Tshas are worshiped at places such as monasteries, Mani piles, snow mountains, peaks, and caves.

In the 13th century, with the introduction of Tibetan Buddhism, the Tibetan art of tsha tsha was introduced to other places of China. Despite repeated destruction caused by nature and human disasters, many tsha tshas can still be found widely distributed in places throughout China.

As the molded works are not difficult to make and the material is easily obtainable, tsha tshas can be found almost everywhere in Tibet, although this molded art, typical of Tibetan Buddhist arts, is rarely known to outsiders. Hence there is an urgent need to inform more common people about this special art.

Not only are tsha tshas valuable for collection, they are also important in Tibetan study, including the study of religion, arts, culture relics, and the culture influences between Tibetan and Han peoples.

Thangka, A Unique Tibetan Culture

Thangka, A Unique Tibetan Culture

Thangka, seen in every monastery and family shrine in Southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, is actually a kind of Tibetan scroll-banner painting and is a unique art form under Tibetan culture.

What Thangka is

Thangka has been in vogue in Tibet for centuries. In Tibetan, thang means "unfolding" or "displaying," and thangka means "silk, satin, or cloth painting scroll." It is most often painted on scrolls or embroidered on wall hangings of silk or other cloth. Common at monasteries, lamas' residences, family halls for worshipping Buddha, and homes of Tibetan Buddhists, thangka is a mark of devotion to Buddhism and often serves as an object of worship.

Development

Nobody knows where and when thangka originated, but compared with Tibetan painting, the history of thangka can be traced back to as early as the Tubo period (or rather the Songtsen Gampo period, around the 7th century), in a combination of Chinese scroll painting, Nepal painting, and Kashmir painting. From the relics of Karuo in Qamdo, we can find traces of thangka.

In the 7th century, Songtsen Gampo united the whole Tibet, hence beginning a new period in Tibetan history. Later Songtsen Gampo married Nepalese Princess Chizun and Tang Dynasty (618-907) Princess Wencheng, further strengthening the political, economic, and cultural connections between the Tibetan and the Han ethnic groups.

The two princesses came to Tibet with many Buddhist scriptures, architectural technology, laws and truths, medical scriptures, and many skilled artisans, greatly stimulating the development of Tibetan society, and especially flourishing the culture of Tibetan Buddhism. At that time, frescoes alone could not satisfy the need of those disciples. So another kind of art, Thangka -- easy to carry, hang, and collect --, appeared and became popular.

During the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911), the Central Government adopted the system of approving Tibetan chieftains to strengthen the control over Tibet. These methods contributed to the development of the Tibetan society. So the Ming and Qing dynasties saw a great progress in the development of thangka. In fact, most of the existing thangka were made during this period of thangka development, which had three characteristics: a larger number of thangka; the rise of different schools; and the existence of many painting organizations.

Thangka, A Unique Tibetan Culture

Content

The content of thangka covers various subjects such as historical events, personage biographies, religious doctrines, Tibetan natural conditions and social customs, folklores, myths, and images of great deities and Buddhas.

The content also encompasses Jataka stories of the Buddha, and so on, involving politics, economy, history, religion, literature and art, social life, Tibetan astrology, pharmacology, theology, and many other respects.

The structure of Tibetan thangka is precise, balanced, thick, and flexible. The painting methods are mainly bright color and line drawing.

Thangka always has a Buddhist theme, and the artists must follow the sacred laws for portraying gods and Buddhas. Passages from scriptures are written in vermilion on the back, and thangkas are always unsigned, so it is next to impossible to know the painter and the age of ancient thangkas.

Process

Thangkas are usually placed upright in a rectangular shape while there are a few that deal with mandala (an imaginary place that is though of during meditation) depictions that are square. Cotton canvas and linen cloth are the common fabrics on which pictures are painted with mineral and organic pigments (important thangkas use ground gold and gemstones as pigments). A typical thangka has a printed or embroidered picture mounted on a piece of colorful silk. A wooden stick is attached on the side from the bottom to the top to make it easier to hang and roll up.

To paint a thangka, an artist usually begins by stretching a piece of cotton cloth on a wooden frame along its sides. Then, a certain type of gesso (plaster) is spread over both the front and back of the canvas to block the holes and then scraped off to produce smooth surfaces.

Afterwards, some orienting lines are drawn to guide the sketching. By following a fixed proportion, the artist creates some roughly drawn images. The featured deity or saint occupies the center while other attendant deities or monks, comparatively smaller in size, surround the central figure and along the border.

Next is coloring. Painters apply pigments on the sketch, with black, green, red, yellow, and white as the basic colors used. All the colors are mixed with animal glue and ox bile to keep them bright. Shading is then done to produce better pictorial effects.

In the final stage, facial features and eyes are sacredly finished, only after a ritual is held on a fixed day. After the artist finishes the details, the canvas is removed from the frame and mounted on a piece of brocaded silk. The wooden sticks are attached to the top and bottom of the silk. After a dust cover of gossamer silk is attached, the thangka is ready to be hung up. Thangka, A Unique Tibetan Culture

Classification

Thangkas can be made in a wide variety of techniques: silk tapestry with cut designs, color printing, embroidery, brocade, appliqu��¦, and pearl inlay. Therefore, there are various styles.

The common size of thangkas, with a scroll at the bottom, is usually 75 centimeters long and 50 centimeters wide. Besides, there is the banner style, measuring is 1.1 meters long and about 3.5 meters wide.

According to the material, thangkas can be divided into two types: One, called gos-thang, is made of silk, and the other, called bris-thang, is made of pigment. The gos-thang is printed on the canvas while the bris-thang is painted on the canvas.

1. Gos-thang

According to the different kinds of silk, gos-thang can be divided into five classes:

(1) Tshem-drub-ma is made of different kinds of silk woven by hand.
(2) Lhan-dr-ub-ma or dras-drub-ma: To make this kind of thangka, different kinds of silk are first cut into different shapes and then connected with needles.
(3) Lhan-thabs-ma: This kind is a little similar to the second, but to make this one, different shapes of silk are glued together by glue water.
(4) Thag-drub-ma: This thangka is woven by hand.
(5) Dpar-ma: To make this kind of thangka, a molding board is necessary to print the pictures into the silk.

The largest thangka of the gos-thang kind is called gos-sku, which is too big to hang up. In fact, it is only used in some special religious rituals. In the Potala Palace, there is a gos-sku with a length of 55.8 meters and a width of about 46.81 meters, made during the 5th Dalai Lama period (17th century).

2. Bris-thang

According to the background color, bris-thang can be divided into five classes:

(1) Tsho-thang: The background is multicolor.
(2) Gser-thang: The background is yellow.
(3) Mtshal-thang: The background is vermilion.
(4) Dpar-thang: The background is black.
(5) Dpar-thang: The method making this kind of thangka is the same as that of water print.

The largest bris-thang is 3 meters long and 2 meters wide while the smallest one is about 30 centimeters long and 20 centimeters wide.
Thangka, A Unique Tibetan Culture

Genre

Different styles of Thangka represent different schools of paintings in Tibet:

1. Karzhi School

Karzhi is one of the schools of Tibetan paintings and sculptures styles. It is said this school follows the painting style that had been used by Karma Mikye Dorje in the Figure Measurement. Karma Mikye Dorje composed the painting him and was famous for painting calm and kind-hearted personal figures.

2. ChenZher School

ChenZher ChanMou of KhongKarLdo in Tibet founded ChenZher, which was born out of, and still uses, the ManThangPa painting style.

3. Mansale School

The founder of the Mansale School was Qiangpa-Quyang Gyel-tshap. The school's painting style is close to the ManNiang School, with characteristics of boorish lines, powerful faces, taller figures, dense colors, and fine painting techniques.

4. Karlri School

The Karlri School was founded by the Living Buddha LanMuKar ZhaXi, who combined the technique of measurement in Tibetan painting style with those of coloring and arrangement in Chinese painting. It has characteristics of large pictures and various contents. This school usually paints personage with a pleasant and pretty face and an implicit smile.

5. JeJuBi School

The JeJuBi School is a school of painting founded by Karma Quyhang Dorje, who absorbed the painting style of Kashmir based on Tibetan painting.
¡¡
6. Manlu School

Manlu School is the collective name of the ManNiang and Mansale schools.

7. DenLu School

This school follows the painting style of scholars like ChiJar andManThang¡��CharKar, whohad written many art books like Figure Measurement Favonian Beads, and so on.

8. ShiGamPa School

The ShiGamPa painting style and schools that have kept this painting style all are under the ShiGamPa School. The school is also called the Nepal School because of influence from the Nepalese painting style.

9. Deri School

Deri is a school that combined the painting style of the Karlri and ManThangPa schools. The school mostly pays attention to the sculpture, expression, and connotation of the people painted.

10. ManNiang School

Founded by ManlaThongZhu in the 14th century, it is the earliest painting school in Tibet. This school almost always paints either smiling or angry people, with a slim and graceful figure and lifelike expression, arrayed in magnificent clothes, and decked in fine colors. In addition, the yardstick of every position of the painted people's body is moderate.

Eight Sacred Buddhist Symbols

Eight Sacred Buddhist Symbols

Some symbols recur on the walls of almost every temple, shrine, and monastery, or on the walls of private houses. The most common decorative motifs of all are the Eight Sacred Emblems of Buddhism, as follows:

1. Conch Shell (dun) - used in Buddhist worship as a trumpet or offertory vessel and symbolizes the spoken word of Buddha.

2. Vase (bum-pa) - used as the storage urn of a sacred receptacle and thus symbolizes hidden treasures.

3. Umbrella (gdugs) - a token of loyalty and symbolizes the protection of the Dharma (faith).

4. Endless Knot (apal-be) - an auspicious geometric diagram, it symbolizes devotion.

5. Dharma Wheel (chakra) - represents the unity of all things and symbolizes Sakyamuni himself.

6. Golden Fish (gser-na) - as water allows fish to swim freely, so Buddhist belief emancipates the soul. They symbolize spiritual liberation.
Eight Sacred Buddhist Symbols

7. Lotus flower (padma) - as the flower rises from muddy roots, so Nirvana arises from this shabby world; therefore it symbolizes purity.

8. Banner of Victory (dpal-be) - a unique Buddhist object, the cylindrical layered banner symbolizes victory over ignorance and death.

The eight auspicious symbols of Tibetan Buddhism consist of: a parasol, a pair of fishes, a treasure vase, a lotus, a white-spiraling conch shell, an endless knot, a victory banner, and a golden wheel.

Groupings of eight auspicious symbols were originally used in India at ceremonies such as an investiture or coronation of a king. An early grouping of symbols included: a throne, a swastika, a handprint, a hooked knot, a vase of jewels, a water libation flask, a pair of fishes, and a lidded bowl.
In Buddhism, these eight symbols of good fortune represent the offerings made by the gods to Shakyamuni Buddha immediately after he gained enlightenment. The following expounds upon these symbols.

The Parasol (umbrella): This was a traditional Indian symbol of protection and royalty. The parasol denoted wealth and status - the more included in a person's entourage, the more influential the person was, with 13 parasols defining the status of king.

Indian Buddhists who saw the Buddha as the universal monarch adopted this concept. Besides, 13 stacked parasols form the conical spire of the Buddha or Tath��¢gata stupa. In Buddhist mythology, the king of the nagas (serpent-like creatures) gave a jeweled umbrella to the Buddha.

Symbolically, the protection provided by the parasol is from the heat of suffering, desire, obstacles, illness, and harmful forces.

A typical Tibetan parasol consists of a thin round wooden frame with 8, 16, or 32 thinly arched wooden spokes. Through its center passes a long wooden axle-pole embellished at the top with a metal lotus, a vase, and the triple jewel. White, yellow, or multicolored silk stretches over the domed frame and a folded or pleated silk skirt with 8 or 16 hanging silk pendants attached hang from the circular frame. The parasol dome represents wisdom and the hanging skirt, compassion.
The Two Golden Fishes: The two fishes originally represented the two main sacred rivers of India - the Ganges and the Yamuna. These rivers are associated with the lunar and solar channels that originate in the nostrils and carry the alternating rhythms of breath or prana (life-sustaining force).

Fish have religious significance in Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist traditions as well as in Christianity (the sign of the fish, the feeding of the five thousand). In Buddhism, the fish symbolize happiness as they have complete freedom of movement in the water. They represent fertility and abundance. They are often drawn in the form of carp, which are regarded in Asia as sacred on account of their elegant beauty, size, and lifespan.

The Treasure Vase: This is known as "the vase of inexhaustible treasures" - however much is removed from it, the vase remains perpetually full. In Southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, wealth vases sealed with precious and sacred substances are commonly placed upon altars and on mountain passes, or buried in water springs. The symbol is often shown as a highly ornate, traditional-shaped vase with a flaming jewel or jewels protruding from its mouth.
The Lotus Flower: The lotus blossoms unstained from the watery mire; it is a symbol of purity, renunciation, and divinity.

The Right-Spiraling Conch Shell: The conch shell is thought to have been the original horn-trumpet; ancient Indian mythical epics relate heroes carrying conch shells. The Indian god Vishnu is also described as having a conch shell as one of his main emblems; his shell bore the name Panchajanya, meaning, "having control over the five classes of beings."

The conch shell is an emblem of power, authority, and sovereignty; its blast is believed to banish evil spirits, avert natural disasters, and scare away poisonous creatures. In Indian culture, different types of conch shells were associated with the different castes and with male and female.

In Buddhism, the conch was adopted as a symbol of religious sovereignty and an emblem that fearlessly proclaimed the truth of the dharma. One of the 32 signs of a Buddha's body is his deep and resonant voice, which is artistically symbolized in images of the Buddha by three conch-like curving lines on his throat.

Shells that spiral to the right are very rare and considered especially sacred, the right spiral mirroring the motion of the sun, moon, planets, and stars across the sky. Also, the hair curls on a Buddha's head spiral to the right, as do his fine bodily hairs, the long white curl between his eyebrows, and the conch-like swirl of his navel.

A shell is made into Tibetan ritual musical instruments by cutting off the end of its tip and furnishing it with a mouthpiece and an ornamental metal casing that extends from the shell's mouth.

The Endless Knot: This symbol was originally associated with Vishnu and represented his devotion to his consort Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth and good fortune. It symbolizes the Buddha's endless wisdom and compassion. It also can represent continuity or dependent origination as the underlying basis of life.

The Victory Banner: This was traditionally carried in battle. Great warriors would often have banners with their own emblems, the banners being carried on the back of their chariots. Krishna (an incarnation of Vishnu) had a banner bearing the garuda bird (a bird deity).

In early Buddhism, the banner represented Buddha's victorious enlightenment with his overcoming the armies of Mara (hindrances and defilements). Legend says the banner was placed on the summit of Mt Meru, symbolizing Buddha's victory over the entire universe.

In Tibetan Buddhism, the banner represents eleven methods of overcoming Mara: the development of knowledge, wisdom, compassion, meditation, and ethical vows; taking refuge in the Buddha; abandoning false views; generating spiritual aspiration, skilful means, and selflessness; and the unity of the three sam��¢dhis of emptiness, formlessness, and desire-less-ness.

The Golden Wheel: The wheel is an ancient Indian symbol of creation, sovereignty, protection, and the sun. The six-spoke wheel was associated with Vishnu and was know as the Sudarshana Chakra. The wheel represents motion, continuity, and change, forever moving onwards like the circular wheel of the heavens.

Buddhism adopted the wheel as a symbol of the Buddha's teachings and his first discourse at the Deer Park in Sarnath is known as "the first turning of the wheel of dharma." In Tibetan Buddhism, it is understood as "the wheel of transformation" or spiritual change.

The hub of the wheel symbolizes moral discipline, and the eight spokes represent analytical insight via rim-meditative concentration. The eight spokes point to the eight directions and symbolize the Buddha's Noble Eightfold Path: right understanding, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, mindfulness, and concentration.