A gray schist double-sided figure of Buddha and Maitreya

GANDHARA, 2ND/3RD CENTURY

Details

A gray schist double-sided figure of Buddha and Maitreya
Gandhara, 2nd/3rd century
Buddha seated in dhyanasana holding the ends of his voluminous sanghati, the heavy folds cascading down from the shoulders, the face with rapt expression with the hair in wavy locks pulled over the ushnisha; Maitreya holding the water pot and dressed in an open sanghati draped over the left shoulder, the muscles of the torso well defined and the face with serene expression, both backed by a nimbus
12¾ in. (32.4 cm.) high

Provenance

Private Collection, Japan, 1990

Lot Essay

Images of this type are extremely rare. Ingholt illustrates a fragment where the Bodhisattva lacks any attributes, identifying it as a possible image of Siddhartha addorsed to his enlightened self as Buddha. Here the identification as Maitreya is given by the bottle and hairstyle, thus combining the current and future Buddha.

Another example is in the Russek Collection, Switzerland, see R. Russek, Buddha zwischen Ost und West, Skulpturen aus Gandhara/Pakistan, 1986, cat. no. 60, where the Bodhisattva holds a lotus flower and is identified as Avalokiteshvara.

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