Page 12 - Blum Feinstein Tanka collection HIMALAYAN Art Bonhams March 20 2024

701
A THANGKA OF PADMASAMBHAVA
EASTERN TIBET, KHAM PROVINCE, CIRCA 19TH CENTURY
Distemper and gold on cloth; with original silk brocade mounts and silk curtain.
Inscribed on the verso with the ‘ye dharma hetu...’ Buddhist creed, Supratishtha
mantra and the following:

གར་དབང་ཐུགས་རྗེའི་གཏེར་ཆེན་འཇིག་རྟེན་མགོན།
མཚོ་སྐྱེས་རང་བྱུང་སྤྲུལ་སྐུ་རྩ་བ་གསུམ།
དཀོན་མཆོག་རྒྱལ་བ་སྤྱི་འདུས་བཞེངས་པའི་མཐུས།
བདག་སོགས་ཚེ་རབས་ཀུན་ཏུ་རྗེས་འཛིན་སྐྱོང་།
ཞེས་པའང་དོག་སྤྲུལ་རིག་འཛིན་གསང་བ་རྩལ་གྱིས་རང་ཉི
ད་ཀྱི་དད་རྟེན་དུ་བཞེངས་ཚེ་སུག་བྲིས་སུ་བྱས་པའོ།

Translated:
“Lord, great compassionate and treasure revealer, the protector of the world,
Lake born and three root guru of self-born emanation,
Unification of all the jewels,
May, I and all beings, accept us as followers and protect throughout all our lives.
This was written and offered by Doktrul Rigdzin Sangwa Tsal.”

Inscribed on the recto identifying the figures in the upper register:
མྱང་ཏིང་འཛིན་བཟང་པོ། (myang Ting ‘dzin bzang po)
རྗེ་གསང་སྔགས་ཆོས་རྒྱལ། (rje gsang sngags chos rgyal)
འཇའ་ཚོན་སྙིང་པོ། (‘ja’ tshon snying po)
པད་རི་རིག་འཛིན་ཆེན་པོ། (pad ri rig ‘dzin chen po)

Himalayan Art Resources item no. 1850
Image: 16 1/2 x 12 1/2 in. (41.9 x 31.8 cm);
With Silks: 38 1/4 x 22 1/4 in. (97.2 x 56.5 cm)

$15,000 - 20,000

藏東 康區 約十九世紀 蓮花生大士唐卡

Padmasambhava’s name, meaning the ‘Lotus Born’, references his miraculous
birth within a lotus flower emerging from the waters of Lake Danakosha in
Oddiyana. Seen together with his two wives, Padmasambhava is depicted in his
most recognizable form with a thin mustache while wearing a feather-capped
pandita hat and nestling a khatvanga staff in the crook of his arm. Located near
the water’s edge along the painting’s lower half are six deities associated with
Padmasambhava, while the upper half is dedicated to Buddhas belonging to the
Lotus Family and influential figures within the Nyingma tradition. One of these
inscriptions identifies the white robed figure located along the painting’s upper left
as Jangdak Tashi Tobgyel (1550-1603), a lay aristocrat who founded Sangnag
Tekcholing Monastery. The Fifth Dalai Lama revered him as one of his principal
gurus, having had numerous visions in which Tashi Tobgyel passed onto him
teachings regarding protective deities.

(detail)

10 | BONHAMS
10 | BONHAMS