J.J. Lally & Co., Oriental Art / New York City, New York
MenuPast Exhibition
Ancient Chinese Sculpture: Recent Acquisitions
March 14 - April 5, 2014
3.
A GRAY LIMESTONE HEAD OF THE BUDDHA
Northern Qi Dynasty (A.D. 550-577)
with delicately carved small features and full rounded face, the narrow eyes heavily lidded below arched eyebrows joined above the ridge of the nose, the mouth with pursed lips, the ears with long pendulous lobes carved with raised edges and the hair carved as rows of rounded pinwheel curls rising over the domed usnisa on top of the head, the fine-grained gray limestone with extensive remains of pale yellowish-tan colored pigment on the face, ears and neck; now raised on a pedestal base veneered in patinated bronze.
Height 6 1⁄2 inches (16.5 cm)
Compare the larger Northern Qi period head of the Buddha very similarly carved from gray limestone, with remains of pigments on the face and with the same distinctive treatment of the hair, discovered at the site of Longxing temple in Qingzhou, Shandong province in 1996, illustrated in the catalogue of the exhibition at The National Museum of Chinese History entitled Masterpieces of Buddhist Statuary from Qingzhou City, Beijing 1999, p. 126.
北齊 青石彩繪佛頭像 高 16.5 厘米
