Early Drigung Painting

One result of the study of the Eight Great Siddhas in early Tibetan painting was the discovery of their distinctive and consistent representation in early paintings of the Drigungpa ('Bri-gung-pa) school. Further, it turned out that a group of early Drigung paintings focusing on a teacher or his footprints follow the same compositional concepts. A detailed study of these and of the deities added or removed from the composition allows to extrapolate a development within Early Drigungpa painting for this type of representation. Identified paintings date from the early 13th century to the mid 14th century and include thangkas as well as in situ murals.

• “A First Glance at Early Drigungpa Painting.” In Studies in Sino-Tibetan Buddhist Art. Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Tibetan Archaeology & Art, Beijing, September 3–6, 2004, edited by Xie Jisheng, Shen Weirong, & Liao Yang. The Monograph Series in Sino-Tibetan Buddhist Studies, Beijing: China Tibetology Publishing House, 2006: 459-88.
• “Alchi and the Drigungpa School of Tibetan Buddhism: the Teacher Depiction in the Small Chörten at Alchi.” In Mei shou wan nian - Long Life Without End. Festschrift in Honor of Roger Goepper, edited by Jeong-hee Lee-Kalisch, Antje Papist-Matsuo, & Willibald Veit. Frankfurt a. M.: Peter Lang, 2006: 181-96.

Eight Great Siddhas

While the importance of the Eight Great Siddhas is generally acknowledged surprisingly little is known about their earliest representations. Also their origin and their meaning is not yet satisfactorily clarified. My study focuses on the 13th and 14th century representations of the eight siddhas taking inscribed depictions as point of departure. Following the iconography of the siddhas and their position within the group and the whole composition the study differentiates their representation within different schools. It also tries to clarify if the visual evidence supports the view that the eight great siddhas became important because they are depicted in the charnel grounds of a mandala or vice versa.

• “The Eight Great Siddhas in Early Tibetan Painting from c. 1200 to c. 1350.” In Holy Madness. Portraits of Tantric Siddhas, edited by Robert N. Linrothe. New York: Rubin Museum of Art, 2006: 76-91.

Tucci Thangka

For several years I have been working on one third (28) of the catalogue entries for an exhibition of the thangkas in the Tucci collection at the Museo Nazionale d’Arte Orientale (MNAOr) in Rome. Deborah E. Klimburg-Salter and Eva Allinger are responsible for the other two thirds of the entries, with Klimburg-Salter providing additional introductory chapters.

The main topics of my entries to the catalogue are Padmasambhava, protective deities, and mandalas, among them the most complex configurations of the collection. Therefore I am focusing on the questions how the respective thangka is to be read and on identifying its different iconographical elements and, if possible, their relationship.

My work on these entries was largely concluded by October 2001, and the exhibition and catalogue have been on a standstill since then. Occasionally, I could utilize some parts of this original research in more recent publications.

• “Art-historical aspects of dating Tibetan art.” In Dating Tibetan Art. Essays on the Possibilities and Impossibilities of Chronology from the Lempertz Symposium, Cologne, edited by Ingrid Kreide-Damani. Contributions to Tibetan Studies, 3. Wiesbaden: Ludwig Reichert Verlag, 2003: 25-57.