Early Tibetan art closely followed Northeastern Indian, Kashmiri, and Nepalese models. Beginning in the early thirteenth century, distinctly Tibetan compositions appear, expressing Tibetan concerns, such as the need to demonstrate authentic Indian sources of their teachings of this adopted foreign religion, and an increasing focus on those teachers that transmitted them (Skt: guru; Tib: lama). Western Tibetan and Western Himalayan art had particularly close ties to nearby Kashmiri traditions.
Beginning in the fifteenth century there was a gradual shift in Tibetan art from an Indic-centered aesthetic toward a more Chinese-centered one, especially in Central Tibet.This shift reflects both the disappearance of Buddhism in India and Tibet’s increasingly close cultural, economic, and political ties to its northeastern Mongolian and Chinese neighbors.
In Eastern Tibet, closely adjacent and overlapping territories with Tangut, Mongolian, and Chinese regions fostered further cultural and artistic dialog. Later, a rapid extension of Central Tibetan monastic networks into Eastern Tibet included transmission of their artistic traditions, which developed locally alongside these regional traditions.
The same artists often produced both Buddhist and Bon objects, finding expression in a shared visual language
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