Our work on the contemporary evidence for traditional ephemeral Bon artistic traditions, was accompanied by ongoing research on the earliest evidence for the impact of Bon visual traditions (c.f. Klimburg-Salter, Lojda, Ramble 2013; Niebuhr MA thesis 2015; Klimburg-Salter 2015; Lojda, Klimburg-Salter, Strinu 2016).

In September/October 2015 Deborah Klimburg-Salter and Uwe Niebuhr visited Tabo where, thanks to a collaboration with the Centre of Image and Material Analysis in Cultural Heritage (CIMA), it was possible to do a preliminary documentation of the paintings and extensive inscriptions dating to the 10th c. phase of the Tabo monastery using multispectral imaging technologies. This could possibly open a dramatic new chapter on the earliest in situ evidence for Zhang Zhung visual culture.

The preliminary research conducted in Tabo is the basis for an ongoing cooperation with CIMA in the framework of a larger "Hochschulraumstrukturmittel"-application (HSMR) that has been submitted to the Austrian Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy in September 2016.

Additionally, comparative material - a Buddhist altar of 35 tormas, different protector tormas, and a 5-torma-set for the ordination of a monk - were filmed and photographed in detail at the monastery. This documentation could not yet been analysed, but will be made available in the Western Himalaya Archive Vienna as soon as possible.