Tibet
Art from Tibet and its diaspora: Buddhist thangka painting, gilt sculpture and temple murals, and contemporary Tibetan artists.
No works indexed yet · 8 related artists
No open-access works for Tibet are in the index yet. They will appear here as more collections are indexed.
About
Tibetan art developed in the service of Buddhism after the 7th century, borrowing from Indian, Nepalese, Chinese and Central Asian models. Thangkas, paintings on cotton that can be rolled and carried, depict deities, teachers and mandalas in mineral pigments laid out on precise measured grids. Gilt copper figures were often cast by Newar artists from Nepal. The Kumbum at Gyantse, a 15th-century stupa, holds dozens of painted chapels, and the Potala Palace in Lhasa rose in the 17th century under the Fifth Dalai Lama. Regional painting schools such as Menri and Karma Gadri developed distinct palettes and landscapes.
Contemporary Tibetan artists often work between tradition and exile. Gonkar Gyatso collages silhouettes of the Buddha from stickers and media clippings, Tenzing Rigdol reworks sacred imagery and politics, and the Kathmandu-born Tsherin Sherpa, trained as a thangka painter, fragments and distorts deities. Pema Rinzin brings thangka technique into abstraction.
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