A painted gray schist figure of Shakyamuni Buddha, Ancient Region of Gandhara, 3rd / 4th century

Collection of Nasli Heeramaneck (1902–71), New York.

Sotheby's New York, 20th September 1985, lot 202.

Private American Collection, donated to the current owner in 2017.

The finely carved schist figure depicts the historical Buddha seated in a contemplative posture (dhyana) with legs crossed in the lotus position and hands folded in the lap. The sculpture displays specific signs (lakshana) of the enlightened being, including the cranial protuberance (ushnisha), symbolising supreme wisdom, and the auspicious mark on the forehead (urna). The hair is arranged in vertical bands with transverse curls, in a variant of the wave or snail-shell curl styles associated with the Gandhara Buddha; cf. the hair of a Buddha head in the British Museum, see W. Zwalf, ed., Gandhara Sculpture in the British Museum, London, 1996, vol. I, col. pl. xv. The Buddha wears a simple, voluminous monk’s robe made from a single length of cloth draped around the shoulders and falling in deep folds across the body, with the end of the cloth thrown back over the left shoulder. The garment is modelled in the characteristic Graeco-Roman sculptural style of the Gandhara region, a legacy of Alexander the Great’s invasion of Northern India (329-326 BCE) and the region’s continued contact with the classical world. Loose cloth from the robe forms a fan shape over the edge of a cushion set on a rectangular plinth draped with a throne cloth. A donor figure, with hands together in adoration (anjali mudra), kneels before the pedestal; cf. the simple cushion and draped cloth on the pedestal of a fragmentary schist dhyana Buddha in the British Museum, ibid., vol. II, fig 36.

The stele is remarkably intact including the halo that frames the head, focusing Buddha’s austere and otherworldly gaze. The sculpture was once in the collection of Nasli Heeramaneck (1902-71), perhaps the leading connoisseur of Indian art during the first half of the twentieth century.