.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
While gilt bronze was the preferred medium for Buddhist sculpture during the Yongle period, the use of zitan is extremely unusual. However, this 'purple sandalwood' with a characteristic grain of needlelike 'specks of gold' is the most highly prized wood in China and most befitting for imperial use. While gilt Yongle mark and period bronzes were generally created as tributary gifts to high Tibetan dignitaries or monasteries, this figure appears to have been made for the Emperor's personal use.
Only one other example of this type appears to be published, at the summer palace Jehol, where Emperor Qianlong had numerous small shrines made to house Buddhist sculptures of various origin and date, see The Chang Foundation, Taipei, Buddhist Art from Rehol, Tibetan Buddhist Images and Ritual Objects from the Qing Dynasty Summer Palace at Chengde, 1999, pl. 88, illustrating an 18th century gold lacquer shrine housing a figure of Buddha, possibly of Yongle date. Other known carvings bearing the Yongle reign mark include a remarkable group of stone and wood models of temples and stupas at Bodhgaya, at the sNar-thang monastery, see H. Karmay, Early Sino-Tibetan Art, 1974, fig. 65, p. 92f; and The Management Committee of Cultural Relics (ed.), A Well-Selected Collection of Tibetan Cultural Relics, 1998, fig. 66 and p. 178, with a figure of a seated Buddha in the central niche of a large wooden model of the Bodhgaya temple.
The tradition of statues of Buddha carved from sandalwood originates in India, the prototype being the famous image purportedly commissioned during Buddha's lifetime by King Udayana. The Chinese monk Xuanzang returned from his pilgrimage to India in the 7th century with two highly prized Buddhist images carved from sandalwood. In the Tibetan context, the famous Nepalese sandalwood image of Arya-Avalokiteshvara at the Potala, tentatively dated 7th/8th century, was copied numerous times in later periods, establishing a tradition of sandalwood carvings in Tibet, cf. U. von Schroeder, Buddhist Sculptures in Tibet, 2001, vol. II, cat. nos. 195 and 196.
While there is remarkable consistency within the group of gilt bronze figures from the Yongle ateliers, the material here likely dictates somewhat more angular features; compare the facial features of a large gilt bronze Yongle figure of Shakyamuni in the British Museum, see W. Zwalf (ed.), Buddhism, Art and Faith, 1985, cat. no. 305 and frontispiece p. 2, which the author also relates to the illustrated sutra woodblock edition published during the Yongle reign in 1419, p. 304.
The dating of this sculpture is consistent with the results of an AMS radiocarbon measurement, University of Arizona, sample no. AA-31271, 1998.
Only one other example of this type appears to be published, at the summer palace Jehol, where Emperor Qianlong had numerous small shrines made to house Buddhist sculptures of various origin and date, see The Chang Foundation, Taipei, Buddhist Art from Rehol, Tibetan Buddhist Images and Ritual Objects from the Qing Dynasty Summer Palace at Chengde, 1999, pl. 88, illustrating an 18th century gold lacquer shrine housing a figure of Buddha, possibly of Yongle date. Other known carvings bearing the Yongle reign mark include a remarkable group of stone and wood models of temples and stupas at Bodhgaya, at the sNar-thang monastery, see H. Karmay, Early Sino-Tibetan Art, 1974, fig. 65, p. 92f; and The Management Committee of Cultural Relics (ed.), A Well-Selected Collection of Tibetan Cultural Relics, 1998, fig. 66 and p. 178, with a figure of a seated Buddha in the central niche of a large wooden model of the Bodhgaya temple.
The tradition of statues of Buddha carved from sandalwood originates in India, the prototype being the famous image purportedly commissioned during Buddha's lifetime by King Udayana. The Chinese monk Xuanzang returned from his pilgrimage to India in the 7th century with two highly prized Buddhist images carved from sandalwood. In the Tibetan context, the famous Nepalese sandalwood image of Arya-Avalokiteshvara at the Potala, tentatively dated 7th/8th century, was copied numerous times in later periods, establishing a tradition of sandalwood carvings in Tibet, cf. U. von Schroeder, Buddhist Sculptures in Tibet, 2001, vol. II, cat. nos. 195 and 196.
While there is remarkable consistency within the group of gilt bronze figures from the Yongle ateliers, the material here likely dictates somewhat more angular features; compare the facial features of a large gilt bronze Yongle figure of Shakyamuni in the British Museum, see W. Zwalf (ed.), Buddhism, Art and Faith, 1985, cat. no. 305 and frontispiece p. 2, which the author also relates to the illustrated sutra woodblock edition published during the Yongle reign in 1419, p. 304.
The dating of this sculpture is consistent with the results of an AMS radiocarbon measurement, University of Arizona, sample no. AA-31271, 1998.