Ta'er Monastery
Location: Qinghai Province
Transportation: Bus service
Culture/History Rating: 5/5
Scenery Rating: 4/5
Hotels: N/A
Summary:
Description:
| Ta'er Monastery (Kumbum Monastery) is one of the six biggest monasteries of the Yellow Hat Sect (Gelugpa Sect) of Tibetan Buddhism. In memory of the founder of the Yellow Hat Sect, Tsong Khapa (1357-1419), an 11-meter-high pagoda was built at his birthplace, today's Huangzhong County about 30 kilometers southwest of Xining, Qinhai Province in 1577. The Monastery covers an area of 144 thousand square meters. It's a group of buildings constructed on the mountain slope with lofty temples and halls rising one upon another. The palace buildings, Buddhist halls, scriptures rooms, sleeping quarters, as well as courtyards forming an integral whole, enhance each other's beauty. The magnificent temples and halls are, in architecture, a perfect combination of the Han's style of palace buildings with upturned roof-eaves with Tibetan style under-eave walls and decorations. |
 | The spectacular Lamasery is scattered with tall ancient trees and Buddhist pagodas. The Propitious Pagoda is the first scene you will see in the Ta'er Monastery. Each of these eight pagodas states a great event in Sakyamuni's great life. The Great Hall of the Golden Roof is the main hall of the Ta'er Monastery with the Han style architecture and is said to be the birthplace of Tsong Khapa. You can also enjoy visiting the Lesser Hall of the Golden Roof, the Great Hall of Meditation, the Peace Pagoda, the Buddha Pagoda and the Kitchen. These structures reflect the superb craftsmanship of the architects then. The three unique works of art in Ta'er Monastery refer to butter sculpture, appliques and murals. Butter sculptures are all kinds of Buddha figures, portraits, flowers and trees and pavilions made of the mixture of white butter mineral dye. Filled with cotton and wool in between, the appliques Here made of silk cuttings show the visitors a stereo sense. |
| Most of the murals in Ta'er Monastery are carved on the cloth. Murals: Its unique characteristic is the fine workmanship, reputed as "no stroke but fine, no place but excellent". Mural paintings are done direct on walls and beams, but in most cases on fabrics. A kind of stony mineral dye is used in painting to keep pictures fresh for hundreds of years. The Ta'er Monastery contains countless murals. There are numerous large-sized colorful and vivid mural paintings in the Great Temple of Golden Tiles, the Great Scripture Hall and the Small Scripture Hall. The pictures of the image of flying Bodhisattva clad in transparent fine gauze are the masterwork among the temple murals. |  |
 | Butter sculptures: Several months ahead of the Spring Festival, artists get to mix pure white butter with stony mineral fuels of various colors, and sculpt them into mountains, rivers, flowers, plants, figurines, trees, elephants, white cranes, old folk, Buddha immortals, officials and and generals, halls, towers, pavilions, terraces, stories of religious life and mythologies. These sculptures, lifelike and in myriad forms and expressions, are excellent manual work. Appliques: They are made of colorful silk-fabric cuttings. These cuttings in the shape of Buddha, man, flower, plant, bird, wild animal, insect, fish etc. are sewn on a large silk fabric, in-between stuffed with wool, cotton or other woolly materials, to achieve three-dimensional effect. The oblong sheets or streamers of silk fabric with appliques of Buddha, scripture etc. hang from the ceilings or upon pillars all over the places in the Lamasery. They constitute a dazzling silk gallery. Artists of appliques pay particular attention to projecting the lines and contours of an individual figure. This fully demonstrates the artistic style and skill of Tibetan culture. |