Page 94 - Bonhams NYC Indian and Himalayan Art March 2019

884 W
A SCHIST FIGURE OF PREACHING BUDDHA
ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 3RD/4TH CENTURY
35 in. (89 cm) high

$60,000 - 80,000
犍陀羅 三/四世紀 片巖佛陀說法像

This sizeable sculpture depicts Buddha with a sumptuously pleated robe, muscular biceps,
and a handsome face. Buddha’s monastic garment courses, drapes, wraps, and pools
over his athletic body, displaying the high sculptural Greco-Roman legacy in Gandharan art.
Raising his hands before his chest, Buddha displays the dharmachakrapavartina mudra, the
gesture of Furthering the Dharma.

The sculpture’s tapering base and its effaced parasol at the top of the halo indicate it was
once part of a larger ensemble, likely a centerpiece surrounded by didactic panels. The
sculpture’s construction and iconography are consistent with the central Buddha images
of an important group lead by the famous ‘Muhammad Nari Stele’ (Luczanits (ed.), The
Buddhist Heritage of Pakistan, New York, 2011, p.163, no.68). Scholars offer competing
interpretations of their subject matter, but generally they are considered to depict either
Shakyamuni Buddha or Buddha Amitabha in their celestial abodes (Harrison & Luczanits,
“New Light on (and from) the Muhammad Nari Stele”, in BARC, International Symposium
Series 1, Otani University, 2011, pp.69-127). Such ensembles exemplify the dissemination
of Mahayana Buddhism throughout Gandhara by the 3rd century CE (Behrendt, The Art of
Gandhara, New York, 2007, p.47).

A closely related example was found at Yusufzai monastery and photographed in the 1860s
(British Museum, 1868,0612.1862). Although constructed differently, with a rectangular
throne, another closely related stylistic example, with the same mudra and showing the
soles of the feet fully exposed, was sold at Bonhams, New York, 14 March 2016, lot
63. Two further examples, one in the British Museum (1880.217) and the other sold at
Sotheby’s, New York, 23 March 2007, lot 6, show the same mudra but are styled with
squarer facial types and a slightly different arrangement of the robe’s pooling hem, and
demonstrate how these sculptures rarely survive with their halos intact – a feature that sets
the present example apart.

Provenance
Private Dutch Collection by 1958
Thence by descent

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