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A STUCCO FIGURE OF AVALOKITESHVARA ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 4TH/5TH CENTURY image 1
A STUCCO FIGURE OF AVALOKITESHVARA ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 4TH/5TH CENTURY image 2
A STUCCO FIGURE OF AVALOKITESHVARA ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 4TH/5TH CENTURY image 3
Lot 636

A STUCCO FIGURE OF AVALOKITESHVARA
ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 4TH/5TH CENTURY

23 September 2020, 15:00 EDT
New York

Sold for US$40,075 inc. premium

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A STUCCO FIGURE OF AVALOKITESHVARA

ANCIENT REGION OF GANDHARA, 4TH/5TH CENTURY
With remains of red pigment.
21 in. (53.5 cm) high

Footnotes

犍陀羅 四/五世紀 泥塑觀音像

From the renowned collection of Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck, this refined and largely complete stucco figure of a bodhisattva depicts Avalokiteshvara with his diagnostic lotus stem held by his left hand. Avalokiteshvara crouches on a large lotus flower, his feet pressed firmly on its petals to support his naturalistic pose. His face is elegantly modeled in three-quarters profile.

With his attention turned to the left, this sculpture likely formed part of a common triad featuring Buddha flanked by the most prominent bodhisattvas in Gandharan Buddhism, Maitreya, and Avalokiteshvara. The remains of a similarly seated bodhisattva can be seen flanking a niched central figure at Jaulian Monastery, Taxila (Ingholt, Gandharan Art in Pakistan, New York, 1957, no.543). Also see a related stucco bodhisattva seated in meditation (ibid., no.542), and a similarly seated buddha in the British Museum (Zwalf, Gandharan Sculpture, London, 1990, p.310, no.587).

Provenance
The Nasli and Alice Heeramaneck Collection
Sotheby's, New York, 4 June 1994, lot 64

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