A magnificent pair of large polychrome stucco figures of bodhisattvas, Yuan / early Ming dynasty

British Private Collection.

Offered Christie's London, 14th May 2013, lot 178.

Minneapolis Museum of Art, 1999-2002 (on loan).

This magnificent pair of large stucco figures of bodhisattvas represents some of the most sensitive naturalistic carving in the Chinese Buddhist art tradition. The pair, probably originally part of a larger set, is superbly carved, depicted seated serenely in mirroring posture, with meticulous detailed attention to their facial features, displaying their contemplative expressions and carefully modelled chignons. They would originally have been placed on elaborate altars in temples, the backgrounds representing contemporary religious beliefs where sculptured figures of Buddhist deities mingled and populated the heavens, creating a vision of paradise on earth within the confine of temple walls.

One such floor-to-ceiling three-dimensional landscape from the Shuanglin Temple near Pingyao in Shanxi, believed to date from the 14th century, is illustrated in Ann Paludan, Chinese Sculpture: A Great Tradition, Chicago, 2006. pl. 324. Other examples of temple interiors recorded to have been constructed during the Ming dynasty are illustrated in Chai Zejun and Chai Yumei, Ancient Painted Statues in Shanxi Province, Beijing, 2008, pp. 330-387. Ann Paludan, op. cit., p. 474, notes that this feature of Ming dynasty temples in Shanxi was due to the combination of rich patrons and skilled local sculptures, and did not survive into the Qing dynasty.

A closely related stucco figure of a bodhisattva, depicted seated in royal ease, rajalilasana, acquired by Mark Birley from Barling of Mount Street in 1979 to decorate the Buddha Room at the private member’s club Annabel’s, was sold at Christie’s London, 20th November 2018, lot 124.

See also a stucco head of similar form and style to these figures in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, illustrated in Denise Patry Leidy and Donna Strahan, Wisdom Embodied: Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New Haven, 2010, pl. A45. Compare also the modelling on a pair of gilt-lacquered stucco figures of bodhisattvas originally acquired by John D. Rockefeller Jr. from Yamanaka & Co in 1936, and sold in our New York rooms, 16th March 2016, lot 360. Another pair of smaller figures, sold in our New York rooms, 20th November 1973, lot 106, was included in the exhibition Ancient Chinese sculpture from the Alsdorf collection and others, Eskenazi Ltd, London, 1990, cat. no 21 and 22.

See also a pair of monumental standing stucco figures of bodhisattvas from the collection of Arnold Scaasi and Parker Ladd, sold at Christie's New York, 14th September 2018, lot 1128.