The fifteenth day of the first lunar month is an occasion of great celebration throughout China as people light up their home and surroundings with lanterns for the Lantern Festival. In Tibet, too, a similar age-old custom persists, with the festival falling on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month according to the Tibetan calendar. But in the Land of Snows, the day takes on a whole new dimension in the form of butter sculptures.

On the night of the fifteenth of the first month, the whole of the Barkhor in Lhasa is filled with works executed in butter in the form of flowers, figurines, birds and animals. Townsfolk and country-folk alike flock to the Barkhor to see the sights. Monk artists from different monasteries and lay artists conjure up elegant flowers and dakinis in various poses out of the abundant local butter and dyes, displaying their works on finely made frames. The displays include fairy tales completing with figurines, flowers, birds and scenery sculpted out of butter, some unrolling like movies or three-dimensional picture-stories. Splendid views and lanterns in profusion draw thousands and thousands of spectators, and in front of these gigantic butter sculptures, people perform boisterous dances throughout the night.

The Great Butter Festival of Tibet first began in 1409, when the founder of the Gelugpa Sect instituted the Great Prayer Festival in Lhasa on the fifteenth day of the first month, and put offerings on display to solemnly commemorate the victory over demons after his enlightenment. People then maintained the tradition by making decorations out of butter and illuminating butter lamps every year on this day.