A magnificent and extremely rare large painted wood standing figure of bodhisattva,Jin dynasty金 彩繪木雕菩薩立像the Bodhisattva portrayed with a serene meditative expression and radiating a dignified presence, the hair swept up in a high chignon secured by a crown with a circular cavity probably for accommodating an image of Amitabha Buddha, sumptuously attired in a shawl and a loose dhoti cascading in voluminous folds, further adorned with a lavish necklace and draped with a scarf around her arms and trailing down163.5 cm来源: Yamanaka & Co., New York, 1925.Collection of the Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, Massachusetts, no. 1925.35.5B.Christie's New York, 19th March 2009, lot 533.山中商會，紐約，1925年哈佛藝術博物館收藏，劍橋，麻薩諸塞州，編號1925.35.5B紐約佳士得2009年3月19日，編號533拍品专文: This impressive life-size sculpture of a standing bodhisattva, imbued with utmost spirituality and tranquillity, provides a window into a golden age of Buddhist history in China, when Buddhism flourished amid an unstable backdrop of chaos and war during the Jin dynasty (1115-1234). A profusion of wood sculptures was created during this period, particularly in Taiyuan and Wutaishan, the pre-eminent centres of religious activity. Naturalistic in its sensitive rendering of the figure, but carved on a grand scale, the full-bodied image displays an aristocratic countenance on a softly delineated face set in an expression of intense serenity. The treatment of the long flowing robes, picked out in varying levels of relief, produces a dramatic dichotomy between shadows and highlights, captivating the viewer with realism and deep humanity. Preserved in good condition with traces of its original pigments after nearly a millennium, it is a sublime creation.The depth of support for Buddhism in the Jin dynasty is evident from the number of surviving sutras carved on stone tablets and by the ambitious production of a new official printed edition of the Buddhist canon completed in Shanxi in 1192, as expounded by Tao-chung Yao, ‘Buddhism and Taoism under the Chin’, in Hoyt Cleveland Tillman and Stephen H. West, eds, China under Jurchen Rule: Essays on Chin Intellectual and Cultural History, New York, 1995, p. 174. It is also evident from the sheer quality and stature of the periods’s surviving sculptures. Such large wooden statues, originally with rich painted surfaces, were created for Buddhist temples in north China under the different dynasties that ruled during the 10th-13th centuries. Many temples in northern China were as extensive as palaces and contained a series of courtyards with magnificent buildings devoted to worship, teaching and monks’ living quarters. The Jurchen rules of the Jin dynasty built on this tradition, gradually adopting Buddhism as the state religion in place of shamanism, and establishing a rich legacy of temples, tombs and artefacts. The deeply carved drapery and heavy ornamentation of figures of this size, coupled with the preserved pigments, hint at the original sumptuousness and overwhelming visual effect that awaited temple visitors. They would have encountered this image in an elaborate stage set with painted murals covering the walls along with many other sculptures of deities and luohan, all brightly coloured and gilded.Carved wood Buddhist figures from the Jin dynasty, of which this is such a fine example, reveal the deep level of influence of the Indian Gupta Empire’s (320-647) artistic style, itself imbued with resonances of Hellenistic tradition. Looking at the bodhisattva, the eye is drawn not only to the form of the figure itself, but also to the graceful folds of the robes, distinctly Hellenistic in their adherence to the contours of a realistically conceived body over which they flow freely. The treatment of the dynamic muscular body, gentle S-curves and features such as the exposed chest do not stem from Han Chinese traditions, where little of the naked body was ever depicted, but pay homage to external influences that crossed the Silk Road to China during and before the Tang dynasty. The carvers of the Jin dynasty did not merely take inspiration from this tradition, but further developed it in their own unique style, as demonstrated by areas such as the face, where the plumper, fleshier treatment of the expression assumed a greater delicacy of articulation, and a softness of modelling matching the outlook of the confident, culturally sophisticated but politically inept court. It epitomises the new humanism imbued in Buddhist sculpture from the 11th-12th century onwards. The figure is majestic yet also exudes a benign calm and warmth that draw in the viewer, creating an impression of greater approachability and emotional connection.Of the famous life-size wood sculptures of bodhisattvas preserved in museum collections, the pair of large wood figures in the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (accession nos. 922.4.6-7), shares several distinct stylistic features with the current lot, especially the elegantly eased standing posture and the treatment of the face and robes of the Avalokiteshvara. Reportedly found in Linfen, Shanxi, before it entered the collection of George Crofts, the Avalokiteshvara figure is notable for the dedicatory inscription on the inside dating it to 1195; see Denise Patry Leidy and Donna Strahan, Wisdom Embodied. Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2010, p. 19, fig. 20. Compare also a large Song to Jin dynasty wood standing figure of eleven-headed Avalokiteshvara in the Cleveland Museum of Art, accession no. 1981.53 (fig. 1); and a monumental polychrome wood standing figure of a bodhisattva in the Nelson Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas, accession no. 51-42. See also a Jin dynasty polychrome wood standing figure of a bodhisattva from the collection of Francisco Capelo, sold at Christie’s New York, 19th September 2006, lot 136.彩繪木雕菩薩立像，雄偉莊嚴，震懾人心，觀者得以一窺金代中國佛教造像藝術發展之輝煌成就。當時戰亂紛擾不絕，佛教給予百姓心靈寄托，遂蓬勃發展，此類木雕大型造像尤以宗教中心太原、五臺山最盛。此菩薩立像，雕刻技術純熟，姿態自然如生，尺寸碩大，沉穩尊貴，面容表情寧靜慈悲，衣袍柔軟飄逸，衣褶層疊豐美，光影下栩栩如生，震撼動人。時過千載，仍可見些微礦彩，保存良好，難能可貴。金代佛教深植人心，金明昌三年（1192年），於山西雕造大量佛教經典石碑，參考姚道中，〈Buddhism and Taoism under the Chin〉，Hoyt Cleveland Tillman 與 Stephen H. West 編，《China under Jurchen Rule: Essays on Chin Intellectual and Cultural History》，紐約，1995年，頁174。十至十三世紀間，此類大型繪彩造像，乃為中國北方寺院所造，許多寺院幅員廣大，建築華麗，庭園錯落，宛若宮殿。金代君主以此為礎，逐漸接納佛教為國教，如此風氣下，金代佛寺、墓葬、佛教文物更顯豐富多貌。如此大型佛教造像，生動逼真，色彩濃重，金彩相綴，供於寺院佛龕壁畫前，伴隨其他神祇、羅漢，光碧輝煌，華美殊勝。金代木刻佛教造像，得印度笈多王朝（320-647年）風格影響甚深，亦略現希臘化時代傳統，此像衣褶豐厚輕盈，彷似輕風吹拂，自然典雅，類同後者造像特徵。菩薩身軀厚實，袒胸，略顯折腰曲線，非漢式造像傳統，應屬唐代以前自絲路傳入的異邦風格。金代造像不僅取材傳統，且發展出獨特風格，面容更顯豐滿圓潤，表情描寫細緻入裏，技法成熟而柔和，集十一至十二世紀造像藝術精髓，反映當時藝術文化發展之高度。此像尊貴超凡，卻也祥靜溫暖，深深觸動觀者心靈。博物館藏品中，多倫多皇家安大略博物館藏成對菩薩立像與本品風格甚是相似，尤其是觀世音菩薩的姿態、面部及衣飾的描寫，均極接近。此對菩薩傳出自山西臨汾，後入 George Crofts 收藏，觀世音菩薩銘文紀年1195年，圖載於 Denise Patry Leidy 及 Donna Strahan，《Wisdom Embodied. Chinese Buddhist and Daoist Sculpture in the Metropolitan Museum of Art》，紐約，2010年，頁19，圖20。另可參考克利夫蘭藝術博物館藏大型宋至金木雕十一面觀音像，藏品編號 1981.53（圖一）。還可比較納爾遜．阿特金斯藝術博物館藏大型彩繪木雕菩薩立像，藏品編號 51-42。尚有一例，屬 Francisco Capelo 舊藏，2006年9月19日經紐約佳士得拍出，編號136。