A LARGE CHINESE PARCEL GILT COPPER REPOUSSE MODEL OF THE BUDDHA OF MEDICINE

18TH CENTURY

Seated on a double lotus base, wearing robes decorated with scrolling borders, with elongated earlobes and his eyes down-turned in a serene expression, the wood base enclosing many scrolls and a coin, raised on a wood base which is inscribed 'brought to Shanghai from a temple near Labrang by A B Sorensen G.N.T.Co', 39.5cm. (2)

Provenance: formerly in the collection of A B Sorensen.

Cf. Complete Collection of Treasures of the Palace Museum, Buddhist Statues of Tibet, p.235, no.224 for another figure of the Buddha of Medicine.

Arthur Bollerup Sorensen (1880-1932), worked for the Great Northern Telegraph Company in Shanghai in the early 20th century, during which time he financed three expeditions in China and Tibet. The first took him to the Buddhist cave complex in Dunhuang in 1909; in 1915 he travelled to Xining in Qinghai province; and his final trip in 1921-22 took him to Tibet. The information he recorded on his travels is kept in the Royal Danish Geographical Society. A collection of scrolls and Buddhist texts from Dunhuang that he acquired in 1915 were donated to Denmark's Royal Library in Copenhagen.