Thangka is a banner painted or embroidered which is usually hung in a monastery or a furnace bridge of family and range by spangled in the ceremonious processions. In Tibetan the word “Than” means the apartment and the suffix “ka” represents painting. Thangka Paintings are a kind of painting made on the surface punt but to the top from which can be rolled once unnecessary for posting. The most common form of Thangka is the upright rectangular form. One also finds the horizontal paintings probably influenced by the format of the Chinese horizontal rollers of hand.
On the basis of implied technique and matter of the Thangka employed can be grouped into many categories. Generally they are divided into two main categories: those which are painted (called breaking-that in the Tibetan) and those which are done of silk by weaving or with the embroidery called (gos-that). The painted Thangkas are still divided into five different categories:
- Thangka having various colors in the painting
- Thangka having a gold bottom of the painting
- Thangka having a red bottom
- Thangka painted on a black bottom
- Thangka whose contours are printed on the cotton support and to the top then touched with colors
Thangkas are drawn on the cotton fabric with the water-soluble minerals and organic dyes, wasted with a solution of grass and adhesive. The whole process requires the great surplus of control the diagram and the perfect arrangement of the principles econometric.
The execution of a painting of Thangka can be divided into six stages:
The painters, Tibetans pay the great importance for the preparation of the surface of painting since paintings of Thangka must be rolled up for storage and to be then unrolled for posting. Any kind of defect due to the negligence can cause cracks or make painting peel with far. A piece of cotton fabric of slightly open armor is piqu above with a narrow reinforcement out of wooden along all its four sides. This slightly then framed cotton is narrowly stretched above a larger reinforcement out of wooden or stretcher with a valiant wire by a system of intersected lacing. After installing fabric in the reinforcement it is treated before and of the back with a thin layer of the gesso, which is composed of oxide of adhesive and zinc. The fabric is then polished sides with a shell of conch or stone which produces a soft and brilliant surface.
Before outlining various parts of composition, eight principal lines of orientation are painted. Those include a central perpendicular, borders, two horizontal diagonals and four external. Maintaining with the charcoal or graphite the rough diagram of the agreement of deity entirely with the canonical proportions is traced. In a given composition, the central stage is invariably occupied by the principal personality, whereas all the assistants and employees are reduced considerably in the face to further underline the majesty and the hugeness from the central figure.
The color is more than one visual proposal in crowned Tibetan Buddhist paintings. The five colors basic are yellow, red, white; green and black have various significances symbolic systems. The black symbolizes the massacre and anger, the white indicates the rest and the rest, the yellow represents the constraint and the food, red is indicative constraint while the green is the known tonality of the practices exorcizantes. The pallet of the painters of Thangka was classified in “seven colors of father” and a “color of mother”. The seven colors of father are: orange blue, green, vermilions, minimum deep, red dark, yellow and indigo. The color of mother is white who acts one on the other perfectly with all these tonalities. Nuances of lighter resulting from the mixture of the “father” and the “mother” indicated under the name of their sons. The written obviousness of the eighteenth century identifies fourteen such “wire”.
For any great project, the principal painter initially visualizes the final arrangement of color and indicates them on the sketch with a shortened system of notation. While the application of the colors which the painter proceeds starting from the distant parts with these parts posted close to them.
After the installation of the initial coats of color punt the painter proceeds to apply the thin coats of the dyes diluted in water. Tibetan Thangkas are always made to add effects of volume and dimension with the form that it is a human figure, an anthropomorphic image of some deity or clouds, water, flames, rocks, flowers, curtains, seats, shades of cast iron etc and climaxes are unknown aspects of the picturesque illustrated language of Thangka. Very often the green field empties foreground is shown that fading gradually in the horizon and such effects are obtained with “the wet nuance”, a technique to mix progressive of two contiguous sectors of wet painting.
In a primarily linear expression colored to like Thangka, art to describe plays a significant role. To place in addition to objects of the bottom or to delimit subdivisions of a certain form, or to underline a whirling mass of the flames, the painters choose the indigo and the lacquer tints for best results.
In the final stage the facial devices are finished and the eyes of the deity are painted. For this “opening of eye” a refined ritual of favorable dedication one day of full moon is fixed and only after vilification the ritual makes the painter achieve the eyes in the fast sure races. The white of the eyes are softened with orange and the red at the ends of corner, of the edges of eyelid is darkened and then the iris is added according to the position required of the deity. The two varieties the most generally mode of eyes are “arc observes” and the grain observed without counting that some looking at alarming for the deity courrouces.
In order to turn the brilliant sectors of gold they are polished gently with a tool inclined by onyx after placement of a support out of wooden against the back of the fabric. After the fasteners of cord are cut with a knife and painting is removed stretcher. Thangka is then assembled in Chinese silk. Usually Thangka is equipped with very light silk cover. When Thangka hangs on a furnace bridge the cover is collected to the top and acts as a curtain. Two narrow sticks are attached to the top and bottom so that Thangka can be easily rolled up for storage or a voyage.
The majority of the artists, Tibetans do not sign their work. Each act of creation is regarded as divine painting with the artist being used simply as mortal instrument, and thus its own identity is of no importance. Moreover, attaching the name to one by one work is considered an egotistic act, and it is the duty of the artist, like all the pious Buddhists, to destroy the fame and pride.
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