Rinchen Zangpo & Art of the Western Himalayas

There is an interesting article on the Asian Art website called A four-fold Vairocana in the Rinchen Zangpo tradition at Halji in Nepal by Mimi Church and Mariette Wiebenga. Rinchen Zangpo was the Tibetan Buddhist teacher that marked the beginning of the 'New' (sarma) era of Buddhism in the Himalayas and Tibet as opposed to the 'Old' (nyingma) begun by Shantarakshita, Padmasambhava abd Trisong Detsen. What is important to know is that the Sakya Tradition was the principal inheritor of the Rinchen Zangpo lineages of practice. The most well known of those practices are the Vairochana Tantras, the Sarvadurgati Parishodhana Tantra and the Eight Deity Panjarnata Mahakala. Khyabgon Sakya Trizin and other lamas frequently give the initiation of Sarvadurgati and occasionally that of Eight Deity Mahakala.