Landscape in Dzongsar, Sichuan Province

Dzongsar (རྫོང་སར།) is a remote valley in Derge County (Kandze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture), Sichuan Province, where the majority of its approximately 6,500 residents are agro-pastoralists. The area is famous for the monastery of Dzongsar, one of the largest monastic universities in Kham during the first half of the twentieth century. In the 1980s, when the renovation of the monastery was permitted, it established craft workshops headed by the few remaining elderly practitioners who retained traditional knowledge and skills. Now these workshops have become real schools of traditional crafts and enterprises. There are currently 27 workshops, in which more than 1,000 artisans work in 13 traditional crafts like lost-wax casting, pottery, thangka painting, and wood carving.

ID: ETAC_2016_07-10_DD_0312