A RARE ELEVEN-HEADED GILT-BRONZE FIGURE OF AVALOKITESVARA

THE PROPERTY OF A GENTLEMAN

Details

A RARE ELEVEN-HEADED GILT-BRONZE FIGURE OF AVALOKITESVARA
MING DYNASTY

Shown seated in dhyanasana, wearing a dhoti secured by beaded chains around the waist and draping across her legs, the borders incised with lotus pattern repeated on the shawl draped over the shoulders, the celestial scarf wrapped around the arms falling to the lotus base, the primary hands held before the chest in vajra-
anjalikarmamudra and a subsidiary pair held in the lap in dhyanamudra supporting an alms bowl, the remaining twenty pairs of arms fanning out from the shoulders and each hand either holding an attribute or positioned in a mudra, the twenty-first pair of hands raised to hold the figure of Amitabha on a lotus platform above three tiers of heads, the two lower tiers with three heads each, the top tier with a single head
12 3/4 in. (32 cm.) high

Lot Essay

Cf. other related multi-headed, multi-armed figures of Guanyin, one from the Fuller Memorial Collection in the Seattle Art Museum, illustrated by Munsterberg, Chinese Buddhist Bronzes, pl. 72; another dated to the Qing dynasty is in the Staatliche Museen Preubischer Kulturbesitz, Museum Fur Volkerkunde, West Germany, illustrated in Hai Hai-wai Yi-chen (Chinese Art in Overseas Collections), Buddhist Sculpture II, pl. 190. Compare also the gilt-bronze figure in a simliar posture, but with only twelve pairs of arms, in the Chang Foundation, illustrated by Spencer, Buddhist Images in Gilt Metal, no. 36.

(US$12,000-16,000)

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