Page 126 - The Arts of China, By Michael Sullivan Good Book

Buddhist art. One of the most perfect examples of the mature Wei
style is the exquisite group of Sakyamuni preaching his doctrine
to Prabhutaratna, Buddha of the remote past, dated 518, in the
Musee Guimet, Paris. The form is expressively attenuated; the
eyes slant, the mouth wears a sweet, withdrawn smile, while the
body seems about to disappear altogether under a cascade of dra-
pery that no longer defines the figure beneath but, like the drapery
of the Romanesque sculpture of Moissac or Vezelay, in its expres-
sion of a state of spiritual ecstasy seems to deny the body's very
existence. Here, the influence on sculpture of the sweeping
rhythms of the painter's brush is very apparent, while the air of
spirituality is certainly enhanced by the extraordinary linear ele-
gance and almost exaggerated refinement of the style of this pe-
l j i The development of the Buddha
image. I Yiinkang (c 460-480); riod as a whole.
.
2. Lungmen (c. 495-530); 3. Ch'i-chou
(c. 550-580); 4. Sui (c. 580-620),
5. Tang (c. 620-750). After Mtzuno

BUDDHIST After the middle of the sixth century, a further, equally momen-
SCULPTURE: tous, change came over the style of Chinese Buddhist sculpture.
THE THIRD PHASE Now the body begins to expand once more, filling the robes,
which, instead of fluttering free with a life of their own, begin to
mould themselves to the cylindrical form, subtly accentuating its
mass. Against these now smooth surfaces, thcjcwcllery of the bo-
dhisattvas provides a contrasting ornament; the head becomes
rounded and massive, the expression austere rather than spiritual.
In the stone sculpture of Northern Ch'i, Chinese craftsmen pro-
duced a style in which precision of carving and richness of detail
arc subordinated to a total effect of grave and majestic dignity.
While the change was stimulated by a renewal of Indian influence
on Chinese Buddhist art, this time it came not across central Asia,
where contact with the West was now broken by fresh barbarian
incursions into the Tarim Basin, but up from the Indianised king-
doms of Southeast Asia, with which the court at Nanking had
close diplomatic and cultural relations. There are abundant rec-
ords of Buddhist images being sent to Nanking from Indochina in
the sixth century, though none of these has yet been identified.
However, in 1953 there was found in the ruins of the Myriad Bud-
dha Temple, Wan-fo-ssu, Ch'iung-lai, near Chcngtu, Szcchwan,
a buried hoard of about two hundred pieces of Buddhist sculp-
ture, some of which clearly show the indirect influence of Gupta
IJ2 Bodhiuttva, Stone Northern Ch'i
Dynasty. art while others have stylistic affinities with the sculpture of the