A STONE FIGURE OF A BODHISATTVA NORTHERN QI PERIOD

carved standing with the right arm raised to the chest and the left holding an amphora bottle, dressed in a dhoti with a knotted sash falling to the knees, the shoulders draped with a pleated shawl falling over the arms and sides, further embellished with beaded jewels, the benevolent face crowned with an elaborate headdress, all raised on a rectangular plinth

A Hong Kong Private Collection, 1970s.

The figure is in excellent condition with traces of gilding remaining to the face and a very light mottled encrusted patination consistent with burial.
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This exceptionally well carved and preserved figure is a classic example of north China’s Buddhist stone sculpture of the Northern Qi period (550-577), one of the most innovative and iconic periods for the art of stone carving. The small figure is exquisitely detailed, with fine even features, the body in the classic, slightly swaying pose. Carved fully in the round, it is conceived as a free-standing figure to be viewed from all sides, the pointed peg underneath the plinth roughened to slot safely into a lotus pedestal. The artist masterfully handled the stark contrast between the plump face and fleshy hands and feet on the one hand, and the highly stylized, flat linear garment folds on the other. The shallow relief of the clothing is particularly effective to highlight the high relief of the complex crown and jewellery, as well as the crisp knot of the ribbon-like shawl that is tied between the knees.

 

The figure is reminiscent in material, carving style and finish of some of the magnificent Northern Qi sculptures of the Xiangtangshan Caves at Hecun near Fengfeng, Hebei province, which are closely related to the Northern Qi court, although the carvings at that cave temple tend to be rough on most of the reverse and are often attached to the rock face at least in one area.

 

Related but much larger figures of Bodhisattvas can be seen in the south cave of Northern Xiangtangshan, where engraving activity is noted for the period 568-72, although figure carving there is believed to have started earlier. Compare two Bodhisattva figures with similar garments and jewellery, in situ on the east and south walls of the cave, see Echoes of the Past. The Buddhist Cave Temples of Xiangtangshan, David and Alfred Smart Museum of Art, University of Chicago, Chicago, 2010, p. 37, fig. 18 right and 19 right, and p.192 fig. 6 right.

 

Similar jewellery and bejewelled crowns, and similar garment folds particularly around the feet, which are also rendered in a similar style and resting on similarly shaped plinths, can again be seen on several massive, over life-size figures from Southern Xiangtangshan: see, for example, ibid., pp. 202ff, cat. nos 19-23 and 30, for a Bodhisattva figure from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond (crown), two Bodhisattvas in the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia (feet, jewels and folds), another in the Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. (feet and folds), a Pratyekabuddha from the Pennsylvania Museum (folds), as well as a Bodhisattva head in the Freer Gallery with similar face and ornaments to the crown.

 

Compare also a fragmentary hand of Maitreya from the North Cave of Northern Xiangtangshan, in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, illustrated ibid., p. 123, fig. 20.

 

Stylistically similar are also a Bodhisattva figure and three heads tentatively attributed to these Caves, ibid., pp. 228ff., cat. nos 31 and 32, and pp. 251f., nos 89 – 91: the figure in the San Diego Museum of Art, with similar jewellery, the heads in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Pennsylvania Museum, and the San Diego Museum, all with similarly bejewelled crowns.

 

This carving style, which was patronized by the Northern Qi royal court is, however, not only seen at Xiangtangshan, but appears to have been influential throughout this short dynasty and can also be seen on other figures such as, for example, the large figure of a Bodhisattva in the Minneapolis Institute of Art, dated in accordance with AD 570, illustrated in Osvald Sirén, Chinese Sculpture from the Fifth to the Fourteenth Century, London, 1925, pl. 273, which is also comparable in its full round face; or a Sui dynasty (581-618) figure with a circular halo, from the collection of Miss Belle da Costa Greene, New York, and now in the Cincinnati Art Museum, illustrated ibid., pl. 308; a Guanyin figure in the Art Museum, Detroit, standing in a similar pose and similarly holding a bottle, dated to the first year of the Sui dynasty, AD 581, ibid., pl. 305 A; and the representation of the feet, the highly stylized folds of the robe around them, and the shape of the plinth can also be very similarly seen on two other bodhisattvas, ibid., pl. 331 A and B; or another much larger Northern Qi figure from central Shanxi province and now preserved in the Shanxi Provincial Museum, carved in much lower relief, published in Li Jingjie, Shi fo xuancui/Essence of Buddhistic Statues, Beijing, 1995, pl.115, where free-standing Buddhist stone sculptures are discussed.

 

Compare also two figures of related size, a slightly smaller one with a similar pointed base to slot into a stand, sold a Christie’s London, 11^th November 2003, lot 12; and a somewhat larger sculpture offered at Christie’s New York, 20^th September 2005, lot 141.