Page 147 - 2020 Sept Important Chinese Art Sotheby's NYC Asia Week

9/2/2020 Important Chinese Art | Sotheby's

dynasty. Through this relationship they had become familiar with Buddhism. They originally practiced animistic shamanism, but
according to Frederick W. Mote in Imperial China, 900-1800, Harvard, 2003, p. 82, within a few decades of the Khitans founding
the Liao dynasty, Buddhism had become the most visible religion in their historical records.

The most important school of Buddhism during the Liao dynasty was the Huayan School whose main center was at Wutai Shan
near Datong. The Huayan monastery located in the heart of ancient Datong and still extant, contains large clay bodhisattvas dated
to 1038, which relate stylistically to the present lot.

A related figure of Vairocana, but sitting on a lotus flower base surmounting a circular pedestal, in the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, New York, is illustrated in Denise Patry Leidy and Donna Strahan, Wisdom Embodied: Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2010, pl. 26, where the authors note that the ‘wisdom fist’ gesture is ‘commonly used
by Vairocana when he is depicted as the central (and generative) divinity of the Diamond World Mandala. The Diamond World
(Vajradhatu) Mandala, a tantric aspect of Buddhism developed in India in the preceding centuries, is a guide to spiritual practice
based on the Diamond Pinnacle Sutra, which was translated by the influential monk Amoghavajra (704-774). A smaller and
simpler figure of Vairocana was sold at Christie’s New York, 17th-18th March 2016, lot 1408.

Comparable Buddhist deities sitting on a lotus pedestal atop a base include one of Avalokiteshvara, in the Museum of East Asian
Art, Bath, acc. no. BATEA: 277; one of the Buddha, sold at Christie’s New York, 20th March 2014, lot 1609; one of Maitreya, in the
British Museum, London, published in Wladimir Zwalf, Buddhism: Art and Faith, London, 1985, pl. 294; and one of Avalokiteshvara,
in the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, illustrated in Hai-wai yi zhen / Chinese Art in Overseas Collections. Buddhist Sculpture, Taipei,
1990, pl. 146.

本像鎏金厚重華美，珍罕難得，屬一類少數遼代銅鎏金佛像精品。本像面相豐圓，寶冠高聳，冠飾華貴，與契丹君主冠飾相近，此皆為同
類造像典型特徵。契丹族居遼河河谷沿岸，為中國邊疆地區，曾藩屬大唐，因而傳入佛教。契丹族原奉巫教，然而經學者查證契丹立遼數
十年後之歷史文獻，可見佛教於當時已更受信奉，見牟復禮，《Imperial China, 900-1800》，哈佛，2003年，頁82。

華嚴宗為遼國佛教流派之首，以大同五台山為中心。大同華嚴寺至今尚在，寺內的泥塑菩薩像，紀年1038年，本品即與之風格相近。

參考一相類例，大日如來佛像，圓形底座托蓮花座，紐約大都會藝術博物館藏，圖載於 Denise Patry Leidy 及 Donna Strahan，
《Wisdom Embodied: Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art》，紐約，2010年，圖版26，作者
敘述，金剛界曼荼羅中央為大日如來佛，多刻畫大日如來佛結智拳印，本像亦結此印。金剛界曼荼羅出自密宗，於印度發展數千年，以金
剛般若波羅蜜經為據，由不空法師翻譯。另可參考一尊大日如來佛像例，售紐約佳士得2016年3月17至18日，編號1408，其尺寸較小且造
型簡單。

再可比較數例，其一為觀音菩薩像，現藏於東亞藝術博物館，巴斯，館藏編號BATEA: 277；另有一例，佛陀造像，售於紐約佳士得2014
年3月20日，編號1609；再比一彌勒佛像例，現藏於倫敦大英博物館，載於 Wladimir Zwalf，《Buddhism: Art and Faith》，倫敦，
1985年，圖版294；尚有一例，觀音菩薩像，現存於荷蘭國立博物館，阿姆斯特丹，圖載於《海外遺珍•佛像》，台北，1990年，圖版
146。

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