Painted slowly, by hand.
Tulika started in 2016 as a two-room studio in Thamel, where three thangka painters shared one north-facing window. Today eleven artists paint with us, and we still answer every message ourselves.
What we paint, and what we don’t
Tulika means “paintbrush”, and everything we sell is painted with one. We don’t sell prints, posters or machine-printed thangkas, and we never will. Every canvas is painted by hand in the size you choose, so no two are exactly alike.
Our thangka painters trained for years under masters in Boudha and Patan, and still follow the old proportions and colour rules. Our landscape, folk and abstract artists paint the places and festivals they grew up with, from the high Himalaya to the mustard fields of the Terai.
Half of every sale goes directly to the artist who painted it. Their name is on the product page, the certificate and the back of the canvas.
Visit the studio
How a painting is made
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Prepare the canvas
Cotton is stretched on a frame, primed twice and, for thangkas, polished with a smooth stone until it takes the finest line.
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Draw the composition
Thangkas are drawn to a traditional grid of proportions. Landscapes and folk paintings start from sketches made on the spot.
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Lay in the colour
Colours go on in thin layers, from the sky and background forward. A large thangka can take two or three months.
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Sign, check and pack
The artist signs the painting, we photograph it in daylight, and it is wrapped by hand with a signed certificate.
Materials & care
What we paint with, why, and how to keep a painting looking right for decades.
Thangka colours
- Used in
- Thangkas and mandalas
- Why
- Mineral pigments and gold last for centuries
Keep thangkas out of direct sun and away from incense smoke at close range. If you roll one, roll it painted side out, loosely, around a wide tube.
Oil and acrylic
- Used in
- Landscapes, folk and abstract paintings
- Why
- Rich, lightfast colour with a protective varnish
Dust with a soft, dry brush every few weeks. Never use water or cleaning sprays on the paint surface.
Canvas and frames
- Used in
- Every painting we sell
- Why
- Heavy cotton and kiln-dried pine stay flat and stable
During the monsoon, keep paintings off damp outside walls and leave a little air behind them. If the canvas slackens, ask us how to tighten the corner keys.
