Page 128 - Tibetan Thangka Painting Methodsand Mat, Jackson

The shading of flames.

into the orange background. Having obtained a smooth Irregular Rock Outcroppings
gradation, the shading per se was finished, and the actual
drawing of the flames (me ris) was added later using red The first technique for painting rocks that we
lac dye. In addition, as a final touch the artist Legdrup will describe began with irregular and non-repetitive
Gyatsho used red-sandalwood dye for creating a hazy designs. Such designs, however, still incorporated certain
outline of brown around the flames, both to indicate predictable features that were necessary for their
smoke and for more contrast with the background successful execution.
landscape.
Blue-Green Crags
Rocks or crags as painted by Legdrup Gyatsho generally
Rocks and Crags had distinct inner and outer strips that portrayed
projecting and receding layers. This structure permitted
The depiction of rocks and crags in the landscape was the artist to colour the adjoining strips alternately blue
one of the main means of adding more beauty - and and green. In its simplest form such a crag consisted of a
even a certain realism - to the landscape. Many different small irregular oval or irregular rectangle inside a larger
techniques were practiced in the various schools of form of approximately the same shape:
Tibetan painting, and some of the more sophisticated
and realistic portrayals were no doubt adapted from
Chinese examples. But whatever their ultimate stylistic
origins, the painting of rocky crags as practiced by our
main informants followed highly conventionalized and
now typically Tibetan patterns. Usually the outer band was painted blue while the inner
Our two main thangka painting teachers for the part was green. Such blue-green rocks sometimes
most part depicted rocky crags in two ways: (1) with appeared as solitary elements in the landscape, and they
more naturalistic and irregular shapes, in which each could also be combined or jumbled together to form
crag possessed differently coloured strata, and (2) with larger crags. When a complicated cluster of crags was
repetitive designs which entailed shading over a con- depicted, the artist assigned the colours to the different
tinuous undercoat. parts in whatever way would give the best alternation

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