Edward Luper
Specialist, Chinese Works of Art
Lot 112
A gilt-bronze figure of Avalokitesvara 18th century
10 November 2016, 10:30 GMT
London, New Bond StreetSold for £22,500 inc. premium
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A gilt-bronze figure of Avalokitesvara
18th century
Finely cast standing with eight arms and eleven heads arranged in five tiers surmounted by one head with a wrathful expression topped by a small head of Amitabha, the principal hands held in anjalimudra, the others fanned out in various mudras and holding various attributes, the body adorned with jewellery and fluttering scarves, with a deer skin slung across one shoulder, standing on a lotus base. 31.5cm (12 3/8in) high
Finely cast standing with eight arms and eleven heads arranged in five tiers surmounted by one head with a wrathful expression topped by a small head of Amitabha, the principal hands held in anjalimudra, the others fanned out in various mudras and holding various attributes, the body adorned with jewellery and fluttering scarves, with a deer skin slung across one shoulder, standing on a lotus base. 31.5cm (12 3/8in) high
Footnotes
十八世紀 銅鎏金十一面觀音立像
Provenance: a European private collection
來源：歐洲私人收藏
The eleven-headed Avalokiteshvara is an esoteric form of the Bodhisattva and became widely employed in tantric visualisations. According to the Karandavyuha Sutra and the Flower Garland Sutra, both compiled between the 5th and the 6th centuries AD, the eleven towering heads crowning the head of the deity represented the ten steps towards enlightenment. The fan of arms holding different attributes signified the measureless means to save all sentient souls from hell; see T.E.Neville, Eleven-Headed Avalokitesvara: Chenresigs, Kuan-Yin or Kannon Bodhisattva; its Origin and Iconography, New Delhi, 1999.
A similar gilt-bronze figure of Avalokitesvara, 17th/18th century, is illustrated in Buddhist Images in Gilt Metal, Taipei, 1993, pp.106-107, no.46. A closely related eleven-headed Avalokitesvara, 18th century, is in the collection of the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Accession no.74.36/58.
Two related bronze figures were sold in these rooms on 15 May 2014, lot 394 and lot 395.
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