A GREY STONE HEAD OF BUDDHA
A GREY STONE HEAD OF BUDDHA

NORTHERN QI DYNASTY (550-577)

Details
A GREY STONE HEAD OF BUDDHA
NORTHERN QI DYNASTY (550-577)
The soft face carved with small chin below the well-delineated mouth set in a subtle smile, with a pronunced hairline framing the forehead and with another pronounced line encircling the usnisa, the tops of the ears carved with parallel curves above the plain, flat lobes
10 in. (25.5 cm.) high, stand
Provenance
F. Brandt, Berlin.
Sotheby's, London, 16 November 1971, lot 18.
J.T. Tai & Co., New York, 12 April 1972.
Exhibited
Ausstellung Chinesischer Kunst, Berlin, 1929, no. 292.

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Lot Essay

Although sculpture of the Northern Qi period shares with its Wei counterparts some stylistic similarities, the present lot is distinguished from Wei examples by the rounded face, delicate treatment of the features, and the manner in which the hair and usnisa are rendered. Compare the head of a seated Buddha depicted in a stone stele dated to the Northern Qi period (561 AD), illustrated in The Splendour of Buddhist Statues: Buddhist Stone Carvings in the Northern Dynasties, National Museum of History, Taipei, 1997, p. 175. On both the illustrated example and the present lot, the usnisa conforms to the shape of the head and is centered amidst the hair, which curves upward at the brow and is undecorated.

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