A PAIR OF RARE MONUMENTAL PAINTED STUCCO FIGURES OF BODHISATTVAS

YUAN/MING DYNASTY

細節

A PAIR OF RARE MONUMENTAL PAINTED STUCCO FIGURES OF BODHISATTVAS
Yuan/Ming Dynasty
Each a representation of Avalokitesvara shown standing atop a lotus base with head framed within a halo and hands held before the body in amida mudra, one wearing a green scarf draped over the shoulders and then looped over the forearms before trailing down the sides of a long, red skirt with striped borders belted at the waist and tied around the hips with a scarf painted with flower sprigs, the other bodhisattva also wearing a long green celestial scarf, as well as a red robe draped over the left shoulder and arm and worn over an ochre skirt with black and white striped borders, each with a pleated green underskirt just visible above the feet, also wearing bracelets and a foliate necklace which spans the chest, the delicate facial features set in a serene expression enhanced by the smooth, stark-white pigment of the skin and set off by the blue pigment of the hair worn in a topknot hidden behind the gilded foliate crown centered with a figure of Amitabha Buddha
85in. (2.16m.) high, wood stands (2)

拍品專文

Similar types of figures can be seen in a number of Buddhist temples of the Ming dynasty in Shanxi province. In the Guanyin Hall and the Thousand Buddha Hall of the Shuanglin Temple in Pingyaoxian, south of Taiyuan, large numbers of clay figures of heavenly bodhisattvas fill the walls. They are dressed in robes whose details are strongly modeled to emphasize the thickness of the drapery folds and the often unusual swirling and fluttering patterns of hems and borders of the layered gowns, sleeves, shawls, etc. Like the present pair they are painted predominantly in red and green pigments with added relief decoration. The facial features are delicate and feminine, the hair arranged in two curls at the front, above the large urna. Similar types of figures can also be seen in the Zhenguo and the Shuanglin Temples, also in Pingyaoxian, Chinese Buddhist Cultural Research Institute and Shanxi Cultural Bureau, Buddhist Sculpture of Shanxi Province, Hong Kong, 1991, pls. 11, 15, 18 and 172-180.