A gilt bronze figure of Indra

NEPAL, 15TH/16TH CENTURY

細節

A gilt bronze figure of Indra
Nepal, 15th/16th century
Very finely cast seated in 'Royal Ease' with his right arm resting on his knee, wearing a short diaphanous dhoti with beaded hems, adorned with multiple necklaces and a tiara inlaid with hardstones and incised with scrollwork, his face gently modeled in a serene expression with a delicately incised third eye, flanked by a lotus stalk supporting a vajra
12 1/8 in. (30.8 cm.) high

來源

Doris Wiener, New York, acquired in 1972
The James and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection, Chicago, acquired from Doris Wiener, New York, February 1975

出版

Pratapaditya Pal, A Collecting Odyssey: Indian, Himalayan and Southeast Asian Art from the James and Marilynn Alsdorf Collection, 1997, p. 69 and 290, cat. no. 81

展覽

On loan to Art Institute of Chicago since 1997

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拍品專文

A signature piece in the collection, this very elegantly and intricately modeled bronze is characteristic for the Nepali representation of Indra, seated in the graceful pose of 'Royal Ease' with his principal attribute of the thunderbolt supported by a lotus flower and with the horizontal 'third eye' on the forehead. He wears a crescent shaped crown that is specific to Nepal. This elegant pose was adopted in Chinese Song sculpture in depictions of Guanyin (Avalokiteshvara); in the Nepalese context it must rank as among the most iconic. His right hand hangs loose in lilahasta, denoting pleasure, play, or indulgence.
Indra is the lord of the gods who plays an important part in the legends, life and art of Nepal, and the best that the Newari sculptor had to give often went into the making of images of this deity; compare to the earlier example at the Norton Simon Museum, in P. Pal, Asian Art at the Norton Simon Museum, vol. 2, 2003, pp. 84-85, cat. no. 52; and to a smaller example with different hand gesture from the Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection, in P. Pal, Art of Nepal, 1985, cat. no. S42, p. 119.