Page 115 - September 20th 2021, Indian and Himalayan Art Christie's NYC

PROPERTY FROM AN AMERICAN PRIVATE COLLECTION
450
AN ANDESITE HEAD OF BUDDHA 印尼 爪哇島 九/十世紀 安山巖佛首
INDONESIA, JAVA, 9TH-10TH CENTURY
來源:
16º in. (41.3 cm.) high 私人珍藏，美國，不晚於1964年。
$30,000-50,000
PROVENANCE:
Private collection, United States, by 1964.

The facial features of this finely-carved andesite head share
physiognomic elements inspired by the preceding Gupta artistic
tradition of Northern India, such as the well-defined nose and snail-
shell curls covering both the head and ushnisha. This remarkable
head also closely resembles the manifold transcendental buddhas
which adorn the great stupa of Borobudur in Central Java, created in
the early ninth century under the Shailendra dynasty.

Compare the precise execution of the stylized, right-whorled snail-
shell curls, the enigmatic smile and the powerful, square jaw with
another ninth-century andesite Javanese head of Buddha from the
collection of Robert Hatfield Ellsworth, sold at Christie’s New York,
17 March 2015, lot 23, illustrated here. For a further related example,
see P. Pal, A Collecting Odyssey: Indian, Himalayan, and Southeast
Asian Art from the James and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection, Chicago,
1997, p. 104, cat. no. 126.

An important stone head of Buddha; Indonesia, Central Java,
9th century; 15 ¾ in. (39.9 cm.) high; sold, Christie’s New York,
17 March 2015, lot 23, for $509,000.