Silk painting refers to paintings on

silk Silk is a natural fiber, natural protein fiber, some forms of which can be weaving, woven into textiles. The protein fiber of silk is composed mainly of fibroin and is most commonly produced by certain insect larvae to form cocoon (silk), c ...

. They are a traditional way of painting in Asia. Methods vary, but using traditional supplies of 100% silk fabric, stretched in a frame, and applying textile paints or dyes are the beginnings of the process of making textile art.

National styles

China

One of the earliest surviving Chinese silk paintings is a 2-metre long T-shaped painting, dated from around 165 BCE, from the

Mawangdui Mawangdui () is an archaeological site located in Changsha, China. The site consists of two saddle-shaped hills and contained the tombs of three people from the Changsha Kingdom during the western Han dynasty (206 BC – 9 AD): the Chancellor Li ...

. However, painting on silk quickly gave way to painting on other supports. Silk painting employs gutta as a resist, allowing fine patterns to be achieved.

Vietnam

Ancient period

Silk painting (Tranh lụa) was a traditional artisanry in Vietnam. There have been some old silk paintings, e.g. portraits of Nguyễn Trãi, Phùng Khắc Khoan, Trịnh Đình Kiên,

Phan Huy Cẩn Phan may refer to: * Phan (surname), a Vietnamese family name * Phan District, Chiang Rai Province, Thailand * Phan River, Bình Thuận Province, Vietnam * Phan (tray), a tray with a pedestal, used often for ritual offerings {{Disambiguation ...

Phan Huy Ích Phan Huy Ích (chữ Hán: 潘輝益; 1751–1822) was a Vietnamese poet. Phan Huy Ich served two dynasties, both the Le dynasty then the Tay Son uprising. About the time of the collapse of the Tay Son dynasty he wrote the preface to Ngô Thì ...

Phan Huy Thực Phan may refer to: * Phan (surname), a Vietnamese family name * Phan District, Chiang Rai Province, Thailand * Phan River, Bình Thuận Province, Vietnam * Phan (tray) Phan (, ) is an artistically decorated tray with pedestal. It is common in T ...

, and

Phan Huy Vịnh Phan may refer to: * Phan (surname) Pān is the Standard Chinese, Mandarin pinyin romanization of the East Asian surname . It is listed 43rd in the Song dynasty classic text ''Hundred Family Surnames''. It is romanized as P'an in Wade–Giles; ...

dated from Lê and

Nguyễn dynasty The Nguyễn dynasty (, chữ Nôm: 茹阮, chữ Hán: 朝阮) was the last List of Vietnamese dynasties, Vietnamese dynasty, preceded by the Nguyễn lords and ruling unified Vietnam independently from 1802 until French protectorate in 1883 ...

Modern period

Silk paintings of the modern period in Vietnam were taken up by some of the students and French teachers at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts de l'Indochine ( EBAI) in Hanoi during the 1930s. The earliest representative of the new interest in silk painting at a 1931 Paris exhibition of silk paintings was Nguyễn Phan Chánh, a student of EBAI who had originally trained in calligraphy, and who struggled with French oil techniques, and so whom the school director Victor Tardieu encouraged to use traditional media.Caroline Turner Tradition and change: contemporary art of Asia and the Pacific - 1993 "Tardieu also encouraged experimentation with such traditional media as lacquer and silk. Although a poor student in anatomy and oil, Nguyen Phan Chanh (1892-1984) excelled in silk. In 1931, he exhibited his first silk paintings in Paris ."

Tibet and Nepal

References

{{Authority control Painting techniques Silk