A RARE LARGE EARLY BRONZE SEATED LUOHAN

LATE SONG/YUAN DYNASTY

Details

A RARE LARGE EARLY BRONZE SEATED LUOHAN
late song/yuan dynasty
Crisply cast in a position of benevolent repose, the left arm raised in a mudra of benediction, abhaya-varada mudra, signifying charity and the absence of fear, the right lowered upturned on the knee, the head crisply cast with the sharp angular features of a severe elderly man, the long jacket with rectangles representing the typical Buddhist monastic chequer-pattern robes of early Luohan clothing, some additional shallow-relief surface decoration on the hems and rectangular panels depicting scrolling foliage, all under a very thin verdigris or light green lacquer
34½in. (88cm.) high

Lot Essay

See Hayek, Chinesische Kunst in Tschechoslowakischen Museen, Prague, 1954, no.115, p.43, for a bronze of similar size and modelling of the face, dated to the Song period; and for wooden versions of such luohan, see Wenwu, 1984, no.3 for a group of forty sculptures from the Song Dynasty temple in Shandong province, Lingyan, Chingqing Xian

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