Page 50 - CHRISTIE'S Himalayan and SOutheast Asian Works of Art 09/13/17

PROPERTY FROM A DISTINGUISHED PRIVATE WEST COAST COLLECTION

626
A DENSATIL GILT BRONZE FRIEZE
WITH OFFERING GODDESSES

TIBET, 14TH/15TH CENTURY
12æ in. (32.3 cm.) high
$80,000-120,000

西藏 十四/十五世紀 鎏金銅丹薩替寺供養天女饰板

PROVENANCE

Private West Coast Collection.
Acquired by the present owner from the above by 8 March 1997.

PUBLISHED

Himalayan Art Resource (himalayanart.org), item no. 24329
Located southeast of Lhasa in central Tibet, Densatil Monastery was
founded in 1179 by Pagmodrubpa Dorje Gyalpo, one of the three principal
students of Gampopa, the founder of the Pagdru Kagyu School of Tibetan
Buddhism. Over the next one hundred and sixty years the monastery
erected eight chortens, or commemorative stupas, each with elaborate
gilt bronze monuments containing the remains of the abbots and princes
of their lineage. The main building’s chorten was a massive three storey
display of shimmering golden deities created by master artists from Nepal
with the help of local craftsmen. Tragically destroyed in the second half
of the twentieth century, little remains from the original site except for a
small group of salvaged fragments which have been preserved in private
collections and museums.
The present work is an example of the friezes depicting ofering goddesses
that were a part of the chorten (see illustration below). Heavily cast with a
thick layer of lustrous gilding, the four goddesses stand side by side holding
musical instruments and accoutrement. Additional examples of ofering
goddess panels are in the Musée National des Arts Asiatiques Guimet, Paris
(MA6262 and MA6263) and in the Collection of David T. Owsley (O. Czaja
and A. Proser, Golden Visions of Densatil: A Tibetan Buddhist Monastery,
New York, 2014, pp.116-119, cat.nos.21, 22, 23). A Densatil gilt bronze
fgure of Paranashavari, the forest goddess, sold at Christie’s New York on
15 March, 2016, lot 256 for $389,000.

O. Czaja and A. Proser, Golden Visions of Densatil:
A Tibetan Buddhist Monastery, New York, 2014, p.18
48