A Rare and Exceptional Chinese Molded Famille Ro

拍品描述

A Rare and Exceptional Chinese Molded Famille Rose Figure of the Arhat (Luohan) Rahula, 18th century Marks: dong wu (East Five) to underside of the figure 10-1/2 x 8-1/2 x 6-1/4 inches (26.7 x 21.6 x 15.9 cm) (work) 13 x 8-1/2 x 6-1/4 inches (overall) modeled seated in dhyanasana on a rock throne wearing long turquoise and pink enameled robe with blue enameled borders decorated with yellow enameled scrolling foliage, the robe slightly parted revealing the blue inner garment, his right hand raised in abhaya mudra and left hand holding the buddha crown, his face in serene expression with slight smile and downcast eyes, the throne exquisitely molded in the form of jagged rockwork picked out in turquoise and blue enamel with black edges, accompanied by an original fitted wood stand Among the most remarkable expressions of Buddhist devotion at the Qianlong court is an exceptionally rare group of famille-rose porcelain figures representing the Arhats, or Luohans. The present figure, identifiable as the Arhat Rāhula, belonged to this remarkable series and is most likely associated with the ceramic Luohans documented in the Buddhist hall of Ningshou Palace (???), the complex created by the emperor in anticipation of his retirement. The Arhat and the Eighteen Luohans Arhatship originally referred to the highest attainment in the Buddhist tradition. One who has attained this state is known as an Arhat in Sanskrit and is forever liberated from the suffering of the cycle of birth and death. The earliest Buddhist tradition recognized a group of sixteen Arhats rather than eighteen. Their identities became particularly influential in China, and over the following centuries they developed into one of the most enduring subjects of East Asian Buddhist art. The phonetic transcription of Arhat in Chinese is Luohan (??), an abbreviated form of Aluohan (???). By the Five Dynasties period (907–960), the celebrated monk-painter Guanxiu (832–912) had established an influential pictorial conception of the Arhats. His sixteen strange, intensely individualized holy men, often characterized by exaggerated physiognomies and foreign features, exerted a profound influence on subsequent representations. By the Northern Song dynasty (960-1127), the concept of eighteen Arhats had entered Chinese literary and artistic culture. The distinction between sixteen and eighteen remained by no means straightforward, however, and the question fascinated the Qianlong Emperor (1711–1799) himself. Court documents demonstrate that Qianlong repeatedly investigated the names, identities and sequence of the Arhats, consulting his Tibetan Buddhist preceptor, the Changkya Khutukhtu, and comparing Chinese and Tibetan traditions. In 1756, he ordered Ding Guanpeng to paint the Sixteen Arhats and standardized their names according to the system associated with Changkya Rölpé Dorjé, his primary Tibetan Buddhist teacher. Qianlong continued to revisit these questions and, around 1787, again revised aspects of their names and sequence and affirmed the group of eighteen. Rāhula, Son of the Buddha The present figure of Rāhula is one of the most personally compelling members of the group. Rāhula was the son of the Buddha, Siddhārtha Gautama, conceived shortly before his father abandoned the secular aspects of his life. Rāhula later studied under his father and eventually attained Arhatship. Unlike the other Arhats, he has an ushnisha, the domed protuberance on his head, in the likeness of the Buddha. Within the Tibetan-derived iconographic tradition embraced at the Qianlong court, Rāhula is characteristically represented holding a jeweled crown with both hands. The same iconography appears in a painting by Yao Wenhan in the National Palace Museum Collection (see no. ??00278300000). Porcelain Luohans in Ningshou Palace The strongest documentary evidence for this extraordinary group occurs in the records of the Qing court's Comprehensive Records of Zaobanchu Workshops. In 1780, an imperial command concerned four zitan altar tables in the Yanghe Jingshe (Chamber for Cultivating Harmony) in Ningshou Palace, on which ceramic Luohans were displayed. The command ordered adjustments to the dimensions of the altar tables. This archival reference is important: it establishes that ceramic Luohan figures formed part of the Buddhist furnishings of Ningshou Palace during Qianlong's lifetime. The use of four altar tables to display them also suggests an ensemble rather than a single figure. The Ningshou Palace complex was reconstructed as the residence in which Qianlong intended to spend his later years after relinquishing the throne and assuming the title of Emperor Emeritus, where he would live a more private life while also receiving visitors. Within it, the complex now generally known as the Qianlong Garden constituted an intensely private environment of architecture, rockwork, paintings, books, antiquities and Buddhist spaces. Yanghe Jingshe, an L-shaped, two-storey building, was reconstructed in 1772 in the fourth and most private courtyard of the garden. Built into an elaborate landscape of rockeries and linked by bridges and covered corridors to adjacent structures, it housed a Buddhist chapel in its eastern section bearing the inscription Xifang Jile Shijie Anyang Daochang (??????????, "Sanctuary of Peace and Repose in the Western Pure Land"). The rockwork pedestals of these Luohans visually echo the scenery of the garden, situating the figures within a designed landscape similarly characterized by abundant rockeries. Reconstructing a Lost Imperial Ensemble Porcelain Luohans of this series remained unrecognized as a group until individual examples began to emerge from private collections. An early published example appeared in Chao Tsong-yea's Ch'ing Porcelain from the Wah Kwong Collection, Hong Kong, 1974, no. 119, where a figure was catalogued simply as a "Figure of an old man seated in a chair of rock in famille rose," dated to the Qianlong period or later. With the benefit of iconographic comparison, it can possibly be identified as Arhat number 15, Gopaka. Another figure appeared at Sotheby's Hong Kong on 29 October 1991, lot 267. Further examples subsequently emerged, including two offered at Christie's Hong Kong on 3 June 2015, lot 3020; two at Christie's London on 10 November 2015, lot 304; and another at Christie's New York on 25 September 2020, lot 1617. Christie's has likewise connected this group with the Ningshou Palace archival record and noted the exceptional rarity of porcelain Luohans of this type. More revealing still is their construction. The figure and rock throne were modeled separately but were designed to lock together with a tongue-and-groove system. On the present example, recessed channels beneath the figure correspond to raised tongues on the throne, allowing the figure to slide securely into its prescribed position. Several known figures bear incised directional and numerical designations on otherwise concealed joining surfaces. The present Rāhula is inscribed dong wu (East Five) on both grooves. Other members of the group are known with such designations as dong si (East Four) and dong ba (East Eight). These inscriptions appear to be directional, suggesting the installation instructions governing the arrangement of the ensemble. A figure sold at Christie's New York in 2020 bears xi jiu (West Nine) on one of the grooves. The survival of "West Nine" is particularly suggestive that nine positions on the west would naturally correspond to nine on the east. "East Five" therefore most plausibly indicates the central, fifth position in an eastern sequence of nine, yielding a complete ensemble of eighteen figures. The same arrangement of eighteen Luohans can also be seen in the Yonghegong Hall in Yonghe Temple in Beijing, formerly the personal palace of the Yongzheng Emperor and later converted into a Tibetan Buddhist temple under the Qianlong Emperor. Further comparison among the known examples allows the sequence of display to be reconstructed: the first Arhat, A?gaja, occupies "West One"; the second, "East One"; the third, "West Two"; the fourth, "East Two"; and so forth, culminating with the eighteenth at "East Nine." An Imperial Object Without an Imperial Mark Equally significant is the absence of conventional imperial reign marks on these figures. Unlike imperial tablewares, ritual vessels and decorative porcelains produced at Jingdezhen, which often bear reign marks, these Luohans were created for the emperor's private devotional use and formed part of a carefully ordered palace installation. Their concealed surfaces instead bear practical inscriptions indicating position and orientation, suggesting that the primary concern was not to identify the reign of manufacture, but to ensure that each sacred figure occupied its prescribed place within the ensemble. Later Qing and Republican-period imitations of this particular set, by contrast, sometimes bear apocryphal Qianlong marks, explicitly asserting an imperial association that the original series had no need to proclaim. A Lost Imperial Ensemble Reconsidered The present Rāhula represents more than an exceptionally rare famille-rose figure. Its identity, intended location for display, concealed numbering and relationship to the handful of surviving companion figures offer evidence for the reconstruction of a virtually lost imperial Buddhist ensemble. The 1780 palace record places ceramic Luohans within Qianlong's Ningshou Palace; the surviving objects reveal how carefully such an ensemble was conceived and arranged; and the emperor's own sustained investigation of the Arhats explains why questions of identity and sequence assumed such importance. Property from the Estate of Gail Grissom King HID03101062020 © 2026 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved www.HA.com/TexasAuctioneerLicenseNotice

图片