A gilt bronze sculpture of a man wearing a crown and standing on a pedestal.
front Photo © President and Fellows of Harvard College
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front Photo © President and Fellows of Harvard College

The gilt bronze sculpture is of a man standing upright and facing the viewer. He is standing on a round bronze pedestal and is dressed in a wrap around his waist. His left arm is down by his side and his right arm is bent upward. His right palm faces the viewer and his fingers are curled in. He is wearing necklaces and a crown. There is some dark wear.

Gallery Text

Buddhist proselytizers from northern China and Central Asia first entered the Korean peninsula in the final decades of the fourth century. In the centuries that followed, Korean Buddhists developed their own traditions of ritual practice and systems of philosophical thought, but they were also in constant dialogue with their monastic counterparts in China, exchanging both texts and images. Icons were frequently presented as gifts among the rulers, merchants, and monks of China, Korea, and Japan, which led to a high degree of stylistic cross-pollination across the three cultures. Private, portable icons like these gilt bronze images—which, though crafted in Korea, share many visual traits with similar objects from China and Japan—provided an ideal medium for intercultural artistic and religious exchange. Such images are likely to have been worshipped on small altars in domestic settings. The portable shrine displayed here, from the Chosŏn dynasty (1392–1910), helps us to imagine the original display contexts for the images that surround it. A mobile, self-contained setting for icon worship, it differs little in form, material, or concept from the portable shrines that devotees first brought from India to Central Asia and China centuries before.

Identification and Creation

Object Number
1943.53.75
Title
Crowned Bodhisattva, Probably Taeseji Posal (Bodhisattva Mahasthamaprapta), Standing on a Heptagonal, Double-Lotus Base, the Bodhisattva's Right Hand Raised, the Left Hand Lowered
Other Titles
Alternate Title: Dae Se-ji Bo-sal
Classification
Sculpture
Work Type
figurine, sculpture
Date
first half 7th century
Places
Creation Place: East Asia, Korea
Period
Three Kingdoms period, Paekche, 18 BCE-660 CE
Culture
Korean
Persistent Link
https://hvrd.art/o/204439

Location

Location
Level 1, Room 1610, Buddhist Sculpture, Buddhism and Early East Asian Buddhist Art
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Physical Descriptions

Medium
Gilt bronze
Dimensions
H. 19.0 x W. 6.2 x D. 6.2 cm (7 1/2 x 2 7/16 x 2 7/16 in.)

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History
Grenville L. Winthrop (1864-1943), New York (by 1943), bequest; to Fogg Art Museum, 1943.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line
Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop
Accession Year
1943
Object Number
1943.53.75
Division
Asian and Mediterranean Art
Contact
am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu
Permissions

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Publication History

  • W. Chie Ishibashi, "East Asian Buddhist Bronzes: A Comparative Analytical Study and a Preliminary Report" (thesis (certificate in conservation), Straus Center for Conservation and Technical Studies, August 1977), Unpublished, passim

Exhibition History

  • S425: East Asian Buddhist Sculpture, Harvard University Art Museums, Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 10/20/1985 - 04/30/2008
  • Re-View: S228-230 Arts of Asia, Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Cambridge, 05/31/2008 - 06/01/2013
  • 32Q: 1610 Buddhist Art I, Harvard Art Museums, 11/16/2014 - 01/01/2050

Subjects and Contexts

  • Collection Highlights
  • Google Art Project

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu