Religious origins
Starting a month ago at the Baimamedo Art Center, a center specializing in promoting Tibetan culture by holding exhibitions and activities in the capital, the exhibition boasted 75 masks from different parts of Tibet, giving the audience a chance to view traditional art that is seldom shown to the public.
Derived from religious art, Tibetan masks have a history dating back more than 1,000 years. Masks can be divided into three types - religious masks, Tibetan opera masks and masks for folk performances. No matter their type, masks show a great variety of characteristics depending on what part of Tibet they are from and the occasion for which a mask is to be used.
In 2007, Tibetan masks were listed as part of China's intangible cultural heritage for the art form's distinctive regional features and the variety it possesses.
According to Jamyang, one of only two certified inheritors of Tibetan mask culture in Tibet, religious masks are mainly used in a religious rite called God Dance or hung in temples for worship. An excellent example of the mystique of religion, such masks are images of different types of gods, protective deities, ghosts and phantoms and therefore help human beings connect with the being they portray during the rite.
Tibetan masks use symbolic logic and hyperbole to highlight the characteristics of different figures. According to Jamyang's introduction, people familiar with Tibetan culture and religion can tell what a mask is by its shape, color and unique appearance.
For example, the masks of the deity known as the God Mother all feature a small nude body in her big mouth.
"It symbolizes the mercy of a mother. She catches her child with her mouth to prevent it from falling down," Jamyang explained.
Other masks, such as those depicting protective deities have several skulls on their head as means to protect from evil spirits.
Compared to religious masks, Tibetan opera masks are more secular and simpler in form, with three holes for eyes and a mouth and decorations for the head. They mainly represent figures, including people, gods and animals, from legends, history and fairy tales.
Similar to the role of facial makeup in Peking opera, one major feature of Tibetan opera masks is how they use different colors to represent characters in different roles. Dark red symbolizes a king, yellow a living Buddha and green a princess. Meanwhile, good people's masks are white and bad people's are black, while witches' are half white and half black, which shows their nature as double-dealers.
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