Page 100 - Chinese pottery and porcelain : an account of the potter's art in China from primitive times to the present day

36 Chinese Pottery and Porcelain

infer that it was taken from a temple or mausoleum, and we know

that there were others with it, two of which were exhibited at the
Musee Cernuschi, in Paris, in June, 1913. This one, however, has
the advantage over the others of being complete with its pottery
stand. The ware is white and comparatively hard ; the colour-
less glaze on the fleshy parts has acquired a brown stain from the
dripping of the cave moisture, and developed a minute crackle, both
of which features are observable on some of the glazed vases from
T'ang tombs ; the pupils of the eyes are black. The draperies, of
which the flowing folds are worthy of the finest classic sculpture,
are glazed with mottled green, the upper robe with brownish yellow,
both of T'ang type, and the latter is patched (in true Buddhist
fashion) with green-edged bands with white designs resembling
divided prunus blossoms in a yellow ground, in style recalling the
decoration of the bowl previously mentioned. The technique, then,

is that of the T'ang wares, but instead of being made in a mould
like the grave statuettes, this monumental figure is modelled in
the round by an artist worthy to rank with the masters of sculpture
and painting who made the T'ang period famous.

When one looks at the powerful modelling of the head, the

strong features composed in deep contemplation, and the restful
pose of the seated form, one realises that here, at last, we have
the great art which inspired the early Buddhist sculptors of Japan.
It is no conventional deity which sits before us. The features are

so human as to suggest an actual portrait, but for the supernatural

enlargement of the ears in Buddhist fashion. The contracted
brows bespeak deep concentration ; the eyes, dreamy yet awake,
look through and past us into the infinite ; the nostrils are dilated

in deep breathing ; the lips compressed in firm yet compassionate

lines. It is the embodiment of the Buddhist idea of abstraction
and aloofness yet it lives in every line, the personification of mental

;

energy in repose. But so rare are examples of this style, that, unless
we turn to painted pictures or frescoes such as have been brought
back by the recent expeditions in Turfan, we must look in the

temples of Japan, not, indeed, for similar Chinese work, but for

the Japanese masterpieces in bronze, wood and lacquer, of the
same period, which avowedly followed the Chinese art. The Yuima

in the Hokkeji nunnery, ascribed to the middle of the eighth cen-

tury ; the portrait figure of the priest Ryoben (f 773) in the Todaiji
monastery, and the portrait figure of Chisho Daishi (| 891) in the