Bodhisattva Guanyin

觀音菩薩

late 500s–early 600s

China, late Northern Qi (550–577) or early Sui dynasty

(581–618)

Medium

sandstone with polychromy

Measurements

Overall: 138.8 x 38.2 x 27.4 cm (54 5/8 x 15 1/16 x 10 13/16 in.)

Credit Line

John L. Severance Fund 1962.162

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Location

241C Chinese Buddhist Sculptures

Did You Know?

The carved and painted back suggest that the bodhisattva was originally displayed where it could be viewed in the round.

Description

The artistic excellence of this bodhisattva is further reinforced by comparable outstanding Chinese Buddhist sculptures excavated at Qingzhou in Shandong Province in 1996—one of the most sensational and significant archaeological finds of the 1900s. Like related types among the Qingzhou finds, this statute has a gently smiling face and meticulous detailing of splendid jewelry. A noticeable difference, however, is the unique yingluo 瓔珞 (mukt hara) worn by the bodhisattva for personal adornment. The somewhat bizarre but imaginative combination of a string of jewels with grotesque animal masks, flying apsara, jade pendants, dragons, and metal ornaments was probably a regional decorative style of Shanxi Province.