Page 52 - Bonhams, Indian and Himalayan Art New York July 23, 2020

848
A GILT COPPER ALLOY FIGURE OF SHADAKSHARI LOKESHVARA
KHASA MALLA, CIRCA 1300-1350
With a Tibetan inscription at the front of the lotus base, Ya tso (sic: tse) mnga’ bdag gyis bdan
(sic: gdan) sa lha tong du phul ba//; translated: “The Ya tse sovereign has offered this to the
monastery of Lha tong.”
Himalayan Art Resources item no.16801
7 1/4 in. (18.5 cm) high

$200,000 - 300,000
卡薩馬拉 約1300-1350年 銅鎏金四臂觀音像
Published
Amy Heller, “Sculpture of Avalokitesvara Donated by the Ruler of Ya Tse (Ya Rtse Mnga’ Bdag)”,
in Ehrhard & Maurer (eds.), Nepalica-Tibetica: Festgabe for Christoph Cuppers, Band 1, IITBS,
2013, pp.243-7, fig.1 & 2.
Amy Heller, “Buddhist Art in the Himalayas and Tibet”, in v. d. Schulenburg (eds.), Buddha 108
Encounters, Frankfurt, 2015, p.84, fig.9.

Provenance
Chino Roncoroni
Private Swiss Collection, acquired from the Paris Art Market, 2009

Shadakshari Lokeshvara gazes benevolently from his heavy-lidded eyes under elegant arched
brows. He is seated above a succulently-petaled lotus—radiant and golden. A minute depiction
of his spiritual progenitor, the Buddha Amitabha, is nestled in his lapis-tinted hair. His finely cast
mouth forms a gentle, upturned smile, while he raises his foremost hands in anjali mudra to
bless the viewer. Shadakshari Lokeshvara personifies the preeminent incantation for the Great
Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, om ma ṇi pad me hum (“hail to the jewel in the lotus”), repeated
daily by Tibetan Buddhists. This exquisite sculptural representation bears an inscription and
the stylistic registers of a newly attributed kingdom of the Khasa Mallas, spanning 13th-to-
14th-century western Tibet and western Nepal, which ranks it among an important sub-group
definitely produced for royal patronage.

50 | BONHAMS