Statuette de Damcan en bronze doré Chine-Tibet, XVIIIE siècle

la divinité gardienne chaussée de bottes abec une robe flottante; une couronne de crânes et une chevelure rouge feu, chevauchant un bouc au cornes torsadées, la statuette montée sur une base, contemporaine ou plus ancienne, sculptée d'un massif montagneux et flots tumultueux

Collectée en Chine en 1929 par Louis Varlez, en mission pour le B.I.T (Bureau International du Travail), Genève, et dans la famille depuis.

Damcan is revered as guardian of blacksmiths throughout the Himalayan region, and in pre-Buddhist times was regarded as a mountain spirit. Padmasambhava, the Indian sage who transformed Tibetan culture in the seventh century, converted Damcan to a guardian of Buddhism and specifically charged the deity with protection of terma, the hidden Buddhist treasures. Although the sculpture was probably mounted originally on a bronze base, the figure has been re-mounted on a fragmentary wood stand carved with a landscape scene which conforms to the conceptual visualisation of the deity, who is perceived as flying through a mountainous landscape astride the mountain goat.