Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Houses & Homes
Typical features of Tibetan secular architecture, which are also used to a certain extent in
religious architecture, are buildings with inward-sloping walls made of large, tightly fitting
stones or sun-baked bricks. Below the roof is a layer of twigs, squashed tight by the roof
and painted to give Tibetan houses their characteristic brown band. Roofs are flat, as there
is little rain or snow, made from pounded earth and edged with walls. You may well see
singing bands of men and women pounding a new roof with sticks weighted with large
stones. In the larger structures wooden pillars support the roof inside. The exteriors are
generally whitewashed brick, although in some areas, such as Sakya in Tsang, other col-
ours may be used. In rural Tibet, homes are often surrounded by walled compounds, and in
some areas entrances are protected by painted scorpions and swastikas.
Nomads, who take their homes with them, live in
bar
(yak-hair tents), which are nor-
mally roomy and can accommodate a whole family. An opening at the top of the tent lets
out smoke from the fire.
Art of Tibet
by Robert Fisher is a portable colour guide to all the arts of Tibet, from the
iconography of thangkas to statuary.
Painting
As with other types of Tibetan art, painting is very symbolic and can be interpreted on
many different levels. It is almost exclusively devotional in nature.
Tibetan mural painting was strongly influenced by Indian, Newari and, in the far West,
Kashmiri painting styles, with later influence coming from China. Paintings usually fol-
lowed stereotypical forms with a central Buddhist deity surrounded by smaller, lesser deit-
ies and emanations. The use of colour and proportion is decided purely by convention and
rigid symbolism. Later came depictions of revered Tibetan lamas or Indian spiritual teach-
ers, often surrounded by lineage lines or incidents from the lama's life.
Chinese influence began to manifest itself more frequently in Tibetan painting from
around the 15th century. The freer approach of Chinese landscape painting allowed some
Tibetan artists to break free from some of the more formalised aspects of Tibetan religious
art and employ landscape as a decorative motif. Painting in Tibet was passed on from artis-
