Page 118 - Christie's Inidian and HImalayan Works of Art, March 2019
P. 118
THE PROPERTY OF A DISTINGUISHED GENTLEMAN
683
A GILT-BRONZE FIGURE OF ELEVEN-HEADED
AVALOKITESHVARA
NEPAL OR TIBET, 14TH CENTURY
7¬ in. (19.4 cm.) high
$25,000-35,000
PROVENANCE
Purchased in Europe, 1990s, by repute
The current work, depicting an eleven-headed, eight-armed
emanation of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, is executed in
the iconographic form frst described by the Indian Buddhist
philosopher Nagarjuna during the second century CE. The form
was later popularized in meditational texts by the Indian pandits
Bhikshuni Shri and Jowo Atisha, and thereafter absorbed into
the essential iconography of Vajrayana Buddhism. The overall
proportions including the slim waist and wide hips, the rectangular
ushnisha, the U-shaped sash which falls above the knees, and
exuberant use of inlaid stone and glass lozenges are all indicative
of the Newar idiom, prevalent throughout Central Tibetan ateliers
in the fourteenth and ffteenth centuries; while the square facial
features and the wide lotus petals on the base of the sculpture
are more commonly found in contemporaneous Tibetan sculpture.
Himalayan Art Resources (himalayanart.org), item no. 24461.
(back view)
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