Shopping: Nepal and India : Hues OF THE Himalayas : Monks Have Used Them as Religious Icons for Centuries but These Intricate and Mystical Paintings Are Also Striking Works of Art

Exploring Himalayan art on a university grant, we are in the Lahaul Valley of northern India, resting on a footbridge flowing with prayer flags. High above us the Kardang monastery sits in splendid isolation. A Buddhist monk who paints thangkas lives there , and we want to see him. The climb will take all morning.

At 11,500 feet, roses and artemesias have given way to alpine flowers and grass. The summer sun stings, but the shadows beneath the monastery are chill. A red-robed monk greets us in the courtyard and shows us into the sanctuary. Statues of Buddhist saints crowd the altar. Draped with white prayer gauze and lit only by a yak butter lamp, they look like ghosts.

Stairs lead up to the sunlit meditation room. Ancient thangkas (pronounced “tang-ka,” a Tibetan word meaning painted scroll) hang on the walls. Many are framed in brocaded silk: Buddhas, meditating saints, astonishing mandalas, fearsome deities. Exquisite as Chinese art, exotic as a lost kingdom in the Himalayas. My friend and writing partner, Maria, and I step up for a closer look and fall under their spell.

Smooth to the touch, thangkas are painted not in oils but in powdered pigments mixed in a glue solution, flexible and durable yet allowing laser-sharp detail with striking color. Thangkas were designed to travel and the thin canvas may be rolled and unrolled many times without harm. Itinerant monks have used them as visual aids among the illiterate since the 8th Century. They are found throughout the Himalayan region.

We recognize the traditional “Life of Buddha” thangkas , each depicting the eight important stages of Gautama Buddha’s life arrayed in groups around a central, serene Buddha. Many thangkas have a central figure. We see mandalas, for instance, which surround a central figure cradled in a geometric circle with intricate details--all of which is contained within a square. Mandalas are sacred aids to meditation that are meant to take the viewer closer to the attributes of the deity within the circle.

As we browse, our artist-monk, looking quite stylish in robe and sunglasses, hurries into the room. He has been learning to sculpt dragons in wet cement, he says, catching his breath.

Poljo Largey is a local man in his early 40s who has lived at the monastery and practiced thangka painting since he was 11. His favorite subject is Padmasambhava, the bodhisattva who brought Buddhism to the Himalayas in the 8th Century.

“I paint mainly in the winter when deep snow covers the monastery,” Largey tells us in English. “Then there are less chores, and I have more time.” He prefers having eight full hours of quiet, but in any case needs three to four hours minimum without moving, he says. Thangkas can often take several months to complete. A single-hair brush is used for drawing the forms and finishing details. This takes great calm and concentration. “My sessions always begin with meditation and visualization . . . and because of the technique and type of pigment, a false line cannot be hidden.”

And what if he does make a mistake when a thangka is almost finished?

“Then there is no thangka, “ he says, without hesitation.

Sitting cross-legged on the wooden floor, the monk shows us a series of Padmasambhava thangkas he painted the previous winter. Each depicts one of the 12 historical manifestations of the saint, and all are for sale. The money ($100 each) goes to support the monastery. We choose two. They are unsigned. He explains that thangka artists by tradition never sign their paintings. Because it is religious art, the artist does not wish to aggrandize himself by placing his name on it. If there is a name on the back, it is the seal of the monastery where the work was made. He rolls the thangkas tightly for us and we slip them into our backpacks.

Weeks later we are in Katmandu where art from around the Himalayas can be found. Rickshaws, motorcycles, touts and tourists meander along medieval streets. Every few feet there is an ancient statue or shrine worthy of a museum.

Katmandu loves tourists, and tourists, it seems, have found out about thangkas. Hundreds of shops offer every kind and quality of thangka . A heavy concentration of thangka shops is found on the little street that leads from Taleju Temple in Durbar Square to Indra Chowk in the old town section of Katmandu. We choose one at random and duck inside.

The shop is full, floor to ceiling. We see Padmasambhava thangkas that are slick and professional. I think of our Kardang thangkas : simpler, more provincial, but perhaps more pious. Arrayed among “Life of Buddha” thangkas are green goddesses, lusty Tantric gods with voluptuous consorts, red-eyed demons with skull necklaces and meditating saints. The selection is overwhelming. We ask for help.

Manoj Kumar, who runs the shop for his father, places a painting on the counter and hands me a magnifying glass. The Green Tara, for instance, is one of the most important deities in Tibetan Buddhism, he explains. She is the great savior, always ready to descend to earth to bring help.

The most frequently depicted deity in thangkas, he says, is the “thousand-armed” Avalokitesvara. He is the bodhisattva (one who has attained Buddhahood but who has elected to remain in this world to help others) of kindness and compassion. Having multiple heads and arms--each hand with an all-seeing eye in the palm--he is omnipotent. Kumar takes down a mandala with Avalokitesvara as its central figure.

The 11-headed form, hardly three inches tall with all his heads, is stunning. Multiple arms fan out like butterfly wings. Each arm has a tiny hand with five microscopic fingers. An eye stares out of each palm. I bend close with the lens, shamelessly looking for a mistake. A missing finger? How can anyone paint 125 arms without a mistake? This is considered a good quality “tourist thangka.” Its price is about $225, but others start at less than $10.

“Seventy percent of sales are to the tourists,” Kumar says, gesturing to the walls around him. “We have to have cheap ones, because most people do not know what a thangka is and do not take the time to learn.” But prices can quickly rise into the hundreds and bargaining is important.

“People expect to bargain in Katmandu these days. And bargaining will often bring the price down. But for my best thangkas, there is no bargaining.”

And where are they? “Upstairs,” he says, with a smile. “Do you want to see?”

*

A back-street door leads to the bright upstairs room. We remove our shoes and he unlocks a sturdy chest. Kumar spreads a thangka on the immaculate linoleum floor and places glass weights on the corners. It is a “Life of Buddha” thangka, one of the most popular designs. It depicts the entire life of Buddha. He hands us the obligatory magnifying glass.

“Look at the expressions,” he says, “the eyes. Notice the details, even minor ones in the corners.” As the glass passes over the canvas, the tiny figures come alive, each individualized by the masterful touch of a one-hair brush.

Our hearts are taken by this “Life of Buddha,” but now he shows us another.

It is a traditional design simply called “Buddha thangka. “ It contains 208 figures of Buddhas surrounding a central Buddha sitting in the teaching position, with his right palm facing out, fingers pointing down. It represents a vision of the 1,000 Buddha worlds, impressive but a bit too geometric and dense for Western sensibilities. Kumar quickly covers it with another.

“This one took 25 months to finish. It tells the legend of Manjusri draining the waters of the lake to form the Katmandu Valley.” As we gaze at the three-by-four-foot canvas on the floor we realize that Kumar has saved his best for last.

Manjusri, found in paintings and statues everywhere in Katmandu, is the popular manifestation of justice and wisdom. We see the colorful saint, in flowing robes with sword upraised, surrounded by snowy peaks of the Himalayas. Down to the tiniest forest creature, it is alive with artistic mastery. We fall in love with it.

The price, $900, seems almost trivial when compared to art prices in the West. Almost. Reluctantly we ask him to roll it up. We want another look at the “Life of Buddha.” Kumar sends out for some cold Cokes. His fixed price is $650 but--just for this day--he will take off $25. We take it.

That “Life of Buddha” thangka now hangs on the wall above our desk. Like the exotic part of the world it comes from, it is so packed with imagery that each time the eye looks it over, it finds something new.

GUIDEBOOK

Mountains of Meditation

Getting there: From LAX fly to Katmandu through Singapore on Singapore Airlines; round-trip, lowest fares start at about $1,500. Various other airlines, including Northwest, Thai Airways, United, All Nippon and Japan Airlines, connect to Katmandu with other airlines in several Asian cities. Lowest fares start at about $1,575.

The Kardang monastery in India is near Kyelang in the Lahaul Valley, approximately 200 miles north of Chandigarh in the north Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, north of Delhi, with Tibet on its eastern border. Chandigarh has an airport and a train station.

In Katmandu: Numerous thangka shops are to be found along the street called Makhan Tole (part of the 7th-Century trade route that ran from Lhasa, Tibet, to India’s Ganges plain) between the Taleju Temple and Indra Chowk. Shops are also found in the Thamel area along Tridevi Marg as it turns north past the Kathmandu Guest House, and in the tourist hotel area along Durbar Marg (try the lobby of the Yak & Yeti Hotel).

The small shop where we purchased a thangka : Shop 1 E. Face, Makhan Street (near Taleju Temple), Durbar area, Katmandu. Mail: Manoj Kumar, P.O. Box 3141, Katmandu, Nepal.

For more information: Royal Nepalese Consulate, Tourist Information, 820 2nd Ave., Suite 202, New York 10017; tel. (212) 370-4188.

Government of India Tourist Office, 3550 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 204, Los Angeles 90010; tel. (213) 380-8855.