Tibetannet

A few days ago, the exhibition regarding Tibet’s national treasure raised its curtains. This batch of national treasures includes 52 items such as gold items and  Tubo stone lions amonsgt which the Thangka named Sakyamuni the Mentor and the Follower Three Statues painted by the founder of the Miantang School was displayed for the first time.

“This masterpiece was made by Mianla Dondrup Gyatso, founder of the Miantang painting school about 600 years ago. His painting style and theory hada big influence on the several subsequent Thangka schools including the New Miantang school, the discovery of the Sakyamuni the Mentor and the Follower Three Statues is very important for research regarding the formation process of Tibet’s painting schools.” The Deputy Director of the Cultural Relics Bureau of the Tibet Autonomous Region introduced that last year the cultural relics investigators discovered this painting work in the Sakya Monastery in Tibet later on, after experts’ evaluation, this painting was confirmed as an authentic Thangka painted by Mianla Dondrup Gyatso when he was alive.

Mianla Dondrup Gyatso was the founder of the Miantang painting school who not only possessed a profound skill in painting he also brought about a great contribution to the field of art theory. He thoroughly and accurately set up a standardized measuring system for Tibet’s painting and sculptures. The Miantang painting school that he founded emphasizes the usage of line drawing in statue making, other than this the school also focuses on the carefulness, fluency, accuracy as well as the diverse coloring in painting. All of this reveals an authentically local painting style, the obvious flexibility in Miantang school’s painting style makes it popular in every place on the plateau, therein it has become one of the most famous Thangka painting schools today.