Page 83 - Bonhams Image of Devotion Hong Kong December 2, 2021

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A WOOL TANTRIC RUG OF A FEMALE FIGURE Tantric rugs like the present lot are made for Vajrayana Buddhist
TIBET, CIRCA 19TH CENTURY practitioners to sit on during rituals associated with the worship of
Himalayan Art Resources item no.4513
154 x 91 cm (60 5/8 x 35 7/8 in.) wrathful protectors. They often employ fearsome images, for the
purpose of removing obstacles on the path to enlightenment through
HKD80,000 - 120,000 sacrificial power. This fine example depicts a gruesome female
figure with her intestines exposed, lying against a sea of blood and
西藏 約十九世紀 毛料密宗人皮毯 surrounded by a band of severed heads. The compositional elements
resemble that of a tantric rug in the Kronos Collections depicting two
flayed male figures encircled by a frieze of heads, exhibited at The
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (“Rugs and Ritual in Tibetan
Buddhism,” October 7, 2010–June 26, 2011). Also see an example
with a male figure published in Henss, Buddhist Ritual Art of Tibet,
2020, p.344, no.457, and several published in Casey, Tantric Carpets
of the Himalayas, Rossi & Rossi Ltd., 2008, nos.1, 2 & 4.

Provenance
Ex-Private Hong Kong Collection, acquired before 2000

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