JAPANESE CARVED AND INSCRIBED WOODEN FIGURE OF JUICHIMEN KANNON
Estimate: £500 - £700
Auction: 12 March 2025 from 10:00 GMT
Description
木雕十一面觀音立像
the Bodhisattva of Compassion with Eleven Heads, Ekadashamukha Lokesvara, standing with a medicine vase in the left hand, the right hand held downwards and facing outwards, the headpiece surmounted by smaller additional heads, the byakugō (urna) inlaid in translucent stone, on a carved, and assembled lotus throne on stepped pedestal, back with nimbus carved with scrolling lotus and twelve roundels of Sanskrit seed syllable kya, back of the nimbus inscribed
Dimensions
43.6cm high
Provenance
Private collection, Glasgow
格拉斯哥私人收藏
Footnote
Compare to two large wood figures of Juichi-men Kannon, one very large dated to the Edo or Meiji era, also with with seven siddham character roundels on the nimbus, sold at Bonhams New York, 14 Sep 2016, lot 155; and the other as a zushi (portable shrine), also with the Sanskrit seed syllable kya, dated to the Edo period, 19th century, sold at Bonhams New York, 20 Sep 2023, lot 596.
The base of this lot attached with a paper label indicates that the inscriptions on the back: ‘meaning made by priest So-En, descendant of famous scholar Michizane Sugaware: when So En becomes 61 years old (for this very important Japanese birthday celebration)’, the paper also stated that this statue is carved from boxwood about 1800-1820.