In a studio located on the banks of the river Zouma , in Chengdu, south west China, the painter Nima Zeren can be found bustling about. This artist, who had once as a teacher the tenth Panchen Lama, is humorous, witty, talkative, and has original opinions towards Tibetan culture. Except for when he stares out of the window to look at the scenery, Nima Zeren never gets tired of holding his brush to paint.
    Nima Zeren’s works reflect a blend of Tibetan, Han Chinese and Western modern painting styles. They brim with profound thoughts and wonderful notions, gushing with solemn and respectful religious connotations and profoundly depicting Tibetan people’s mystical perception of the world.
    Nima Zeren believes that his paintings are borne out of Tibetan culture. He says, “Every image and every symbol is impregnated with historical connotations.” In Nima Zeren’s paintings, people seem very insignificant. To this, he says, “For us Tibetans, nature is sacred, and people are just elements in it. Regardless how great a creation is, nature can, in a twinkling of an eye. destroy it. Mankind can only rely on spiritual power and living in harmony with nature. In what was once a poor and barren environment, Tibetans managed to survive; what they relied on was this kind of spirit.”
    Nima Zeren’s inspiration comes from many years ago. At the time, having just graduated from the Sichuan art college, he set out on a trip to the countryside. He found himself in the middle of a huge gale, so strong that it could almost lift someone lying on the floor. Just as he was marveling at the at the great power of nature, he saw far away some women running about, calling out for their missing yaks. “At that moment, I felt that I had suddenly grasped something. In their harsh natural environment they showed an obstinate vitality, that’s the spirit of Tibetans. It is exactly this kind of spirit that has run through the whole course of history, culture and art of the Tibetan people,” he says.
    The outside world has called Nima Zeren’s recent paintings “new” Tangkas (a Tangka is a traditional Tibetan painting). But Nima Zeren believes that Tangkas, as consecrated objects in temples, are too constrained by their fixed pattern, and cannot communicate cultural information of this new era’s new living ways. He comments, “The need for Tibetan culture to develop cannot and should not be blocked off by the great snowy mountains. Painting, as a kind of universal language, is a very good medium for spreading Tibetan culture. But this kind of dissemination must be built up on new foundations, guiding the traditional spirit into modern concepts, so as to be more easily accepted by contemporary people.”
    Nima Zeren has started on his own creative path of painting. In his paintings there are remnants of the bright colors of Tibetan painting, with exaggerated shapes and timeless features, fusing the lines of Chinese painting and the three-dimensional shapes of western art, drawing a certain distance from the traditional Tangka paintings.
    Some people criticized Nima Zeren’s exploration of Tibetan painting saying that he was “ walking on a devious road,” and even his mother had said that she preferred his earlier work. Nima Zeren, perplexed, started to doubt himself.
    But then, the tenth Panchen Lama gave him his support, telling him to give the painting the name of “The Tenth Panchen Lama “. The Lama told Nima: “Since you understand Buddhist culture, and also understand Chinese and western culture, you should blend them together, and thus further develop the great Tibetan culture.
    In fact, Nima Zeren is not only simply regenerating the concepts of religious painting, but he is also taking Tibetan art to unprecedented heights. In his paintings, the elements of Tibetan culture are not very complicated, and there are even symbolic images that are not emblematic. This gives his works the ability to break from the lack of understanding of cultural boundaries. For Nima Zeren, painting is not simply a way of depicting images of Tibetan customs... It is the magic strokes themselves that speak about the spirit of Tibetan culture. This makes him break away one step further from the restrictions of form and topic; a tree, a stone, a person, or a beast can under his brush find some sort of Tibetan cultural branding. There’s no need to represent the symbol, but its vitality can be represented to the limit.
    Nima Zeren has become very successful. His new way of painting Tibetan subjects has received acclamation the world over, bringing him many honors. He was awarded the prize of “the most outstanding international artist” by the city of Liverpool in the UK in 1994.
    Nima Zeren tells reporters that at present he is not in a hurry to create new works. Smiling, he says, “In comparison with foreign artists, we Chinese artists are very lucky, we do not need to think about our means of livelihood all day.”
    He wants to spend more of his time traveling, to be able to appreciate foreign culture and arts, and to find inspiration for his future works. He hopes to leave behind a few works that can inspire future Tibetan artists.
    Nima Zeren has bought six mu (one mu equals 0.0667 hectares) of land to build an exhibition room. “I want my son to build it. If I have an exhibition room more people will be able to see my works,” remarks Nima Zeren, in a complacent tone.