Tibetan Butter Sculpture

Tibetan butter sculpture — torma, or tsepdro — is a votive relief art molded from dyed yak butter and barley flour, tinted with the same mineral pigments that color thangka painting: cinnabar, azurite, malachite, orpiment, pearl. Stacked into tiered conical forms and crowned with flame and lotus-petal ornament, the offerings are set on dark monastery altars and read by butter-lamp light, especially at Losar, the Tibetan New Year. This system translates that altar into a screen: a saturated, densely ornamented bright relief glowing out of near-black temple gloom, every surface hand-worked and maximally detailed.

藏式酥油花（torma / 朵玛）是一门以牦牛酥油和青稞面塑造的供养浮雕，用唐卡矿物颜料逐层 染色——朱砂的赤、石青的蓝、石绿、雌黄与金的黄、珍珠的白。匠人将其叠塑成层层收束的锥 形宝塔，顶饰火焰与莲瓣，供奉在幽暗的佛殿祭坛上，于酥油灯光中观瞻，尤以藏历新年洛萨节 最盛。 这套系统把祭坛搬上屏幕：在近乎全黑的殿堂幽暗里，一座饱和而繁密的明亮浮雕缓缓发光。每 一处表面都经手塑，密不透风，极尽繁缛之能事——这是供养的语言，不是留白的语言。