Footnotes

A GILT COPPER ALLOY FIGURE OF KRODHA VAJRAPANI
TIBET, 14TH CENTURY

西藏 十四世紀 銅鎏金金剛手菩薩像

Published:
Arman Neven, Le Tantrisme dans l'art et la Pansee, Bruxelles, 1974, p. 76, no. 389.

Exhibited:
Le Tantrisme dans l'art et la Pansee, Palais des Beaux-Arts, Bruxelles, March - 10 April 1974.

Provenance:
With Claude de Marteau, Brussels, by 1974

This rare figure depicts Krodha Vajrapani (lit. wrathful vajra bearer), who is distinguished from his numerous other forms by the combination of the vajra he brandishes above his head and the bell he rests against his hip, dampening its sonorous ring. Even scarcer among gilt bronzes of this subject is a windswept cloak clinging to this Krodha Vajrapani's immense frame, conveying the wrathful deity's astonishing agility and vigor as he crushes a pair of demons beneath his feet. Counter to his brutality, there is a jollity to Vajrapani's pudgy grimace and an apparent reluctance by the artist to depict him with a grotesque face, thereby producing a more endearing representation of Buddhism's primary protector, who uses his invincibility to help the religion's followers.

The style of this work belongs to a long artistic tradition that traces back to Northeastern India around the 11th and 12th centuries and spreads to Nepal, Tibet, and China. To begin with, the sensuous curls of the lotus petals, and the lavishly beaded rim that decorates the edges of Vajrapani's lotus base, derive from sculptures of the Late Pala period (see von Schroeder, Buddhist Sculptures in Tibet, Vol. I, 2001, pp. 299 & 303, nos. 100B & 102B). These elements were continued to great effect by the Newars, an ethnic group from Nepal's Kathmandu Valley whose artistry was renowned for its sensitive modelling and benign visages.

The Newars were highly sought-after for major artistic projects in Tibet and China during the Early Malla period (1200-1482), a time of prosperity that coincided with Tibetan rule between the Sakya order and the Yuan dynasty (1279-1368). It was within this political climate around the 14th century that the present work was made, likely by a Newari artist for a Tibetan donor or monastery, based on the presence of a consecration plate underneath the base. See a 14th-century image of Panjaranata Mahakala from the Claude de Marteau Collection, Part 2, sold at Bonhams, Paris, 4 October 2022, lot 9, that draws many close parallels to the present work. Such parallels include Vajrapani's rotund physique based on proportions favored by Newaris and the lack of inset stones to emphasize his rich gilding instead. These types of images later gave rise to the art of the early Ming dynasty, whose rulers strived to model themselves as the spiritual successors to the Mongol rulers of the Yuan in their continuing sponsorship of monasteries and artists. See a Yongle image of Hayagriva with hooped jewelry, dwarfish features, and rotund dimensions like the following work, published in von Schroeder, Buddhist Sculptures in Tibet, Vol. II, 2001, p. 1261, nos. 348C-D. Lastly, compare an image of Legden Mahakala who sports a similar cloud-collared robe in the Rubin Museum of Art, New York (C2003.10.3; HAR 65208).