YONGLE INCISED SIX-CHARACTER PRESENTATION MARK AND OF THE PERIOD (1403-1424)

The present figure belongs to a very rare group of smaller sized Buddhist images from the Yongle period that are finely and skilfully cast. Other similar Yongle-marked gilt-bronze figures from this group include a slightly larger (20.5 cm. high) seated figure of Amitayus with a cold-painted face in the State Hermitage Museum, St Petersburg, inventory number y-656; a standing figure of Amitayus of comparable overall height (18.4 cm. high), sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 3 June 2015, lot 3009 (fig. 1); and a standing figure of Sakyamuni (19 cm. high) from the Speelman Collection, sold at Sotheby’s Hong Kong, 7 October 2006, lot 803. Buddhist images from the first half of the fifteenth century were greatly influenced by the art of Tibet. In the preceding century under the Yuan Dynasty, the authority of Mongol rulers had become closely associated with Tibetan Buddhist or Lamaist rituals. The tradition of Lamaist art continued into the Ming period and prevailed in works of art such as the present sculpture.