Page 34 - 2020 December 2 Bonhams Arts of Devotion bronzes and Stone carvings

1015
A GILT COPPER ALLOY FIGURE OF GUHYASAMAJA MANJUVAJRA
TIBET, 16TH CENTURY
Himalayan Art Resources item no.16900
29 cm (11 3/8 in.) high

HKD3,500,000 - 4,500,000

西藏 十六世紀 銅鎏金密集文殊金剛像

Speckled with turquoise cabochons, the sculpture is a large and powerful, gilded
example of Guhyasamaja. Guhyasamaja is one of the earliest and most important
yidams (transformative deities) in Tantric Buddhism, dating to 8th-/9th-century
India, and referred to in Tibet as the “king of tantras”. A yidam represents a series
of tantric insights and practices that can provide a skilled practitioner with an
accelerated means to achieving Buddhahood. Portrayed here by ‘Father’ and
‘Mother’ deities in interpenetrative congress, Guhyasamaja represents a complete
and perfect union of male and female divine phenomena. The text label written for
the sculpture during its exhibition at the Wellcome Center, London further explains
the conceptual basis for this impressive visual subject:

“The Guhyasamaja, or ‘Secret Assembly’, Tantra describes practices of sexual
yoga for transforming ordinary desire into self-transcendent compassion. Many of
Tantric Buddhism’s core practices were incompatible with monastic culture and
were thus practiced either in secret or in lay communities unconstrained by vows
of celibacy. However, the representations of Tantric deities in sexual union has less
to do with sex than with the integrations of energetic polarities with the psyche and
the realization of the non-duality of self and other.”

There are a few forms of Guhyasamaja, representing esoteric insights and
practices associated with prominent buddhas and bodhisattvas. This sculpture
depicts Guhyasamaja Manjuvajra associated with Manjushri, the Great Bodhisattva
of Wisdom. Manjuvajra looks very similar to another form that is associated with
Buddha Akshobhya called Guhyasamaja Akshobhyavajra. Both depict ‘Father’ and
‘Mother’ deities with a fanned array of six arms, but Akshobhyavajra has a third
eye on each face while Manjuvajra does not. Guhyasamaja Manjuvajra occupies
the central position within his own dedicated mandala, meaning that this sculpture
might well have been the centerpiece of a grand ensemble of gilded sculptures
depicting his mandala produced at a major monastery.

32 | BONHAMS