Item: Teacher (Lama) - Teacher

Mongolian Judge.

This fifteenth-century painting depicts a Mongolian patron-judge sitting atop a regal throne. Since the conquest of Tibet by Kublai Khan in the thirteenth century, the Tibetans and the Mongols have shared a complex relationship: Kublai Khan consolidated Tibet into the new Yuan dynasty and established the Chö Yön, or Priest-Patron, relationship between the Tibetans and the Mongols. This unique central Asian symbiosis entailed the protection and making of offerings by the secular patron to his spiritual teacher and master, in return for religious teachings and the bestowal of spiritual protection and blessings by the lama to his patron.

The best-known example of the socio-religious relation between an imperial preceptor and a secular ruler was established between the Tibetan Sakyapa Lama Phagpa Lodro Gyaltsen and the emperor of the Sino-Mongol Yuan dynasty Kublai Khan (r. 1260- 1294). The relationship between Phagpa and Kublai was not merely that of student and disciple, but rather it was perceived as the sharing of power between two equally realized deities. By elevating both the ruler and monk, the Mongols implemented a “bodhisattva-centric” polity. Within the religious framework, Phagpa was regarded as the manifestation of the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokitesvara, and his disciple, ruler of the Mongol empire, was regarded as a manifestation of the bodhisattva Manjushri. The two figures, therefore, had equal status in the realm of Tibetan Buddhism, and shared in the right to rule. Kublai Khan’s manifestation as Manjushri became especially significant when the Manchus conquered China in 1644 and declared themselves Kublai's spiritual and political inheritors as emanations of the same deity. The present painting of a Mongolian judge official demonstrates the relationship between Mongol rulers and Tibetan religious institutions. The central figure sits atop an elaborately ornamented throne with Chinese-style dragons coiling around the columns. Although ostensibly Chinese in appearance, on closer inspection, the incorporation of the victory banners, along with the bumpa vase placed at the top of the throne pillar, a classical motif within Tibetan architecture, indicates a likely Tibetan origin of the painting. The Judge is seated on a floral cushion facing the right, with his face in three-quarter view. He wears a jeweled crown and a flowing green robe decorated with flower and dragon motifs. The belt and the robe reflect what was typically worn in the Chinese imperial court during the Ming dynasty (1388-1644). This stylistic detail can be compared with a painting of the Xuande Emperor in the Palace Museum, Taipei, illustrated in Craig Clunas’ Empire of Great Brightness, Chicago, 2007. Furthermore, the elaborate jeweled crown worn by the judge is similar to those found in Ming dynasty water-and-land ritual paintings in Fa Hai Monastery in Beijing illustrated in Fo Zaoxiang Juan, Beijing, 2003, p 25.

Behind the central figure, the artist employs space-cells, a technique from Chinese painting used to create visual intrigue and an illusion of space: he depicts two half-hidden servants peeking out behind a screen and a throne back, implying the extension of space. The most noted example of this technique is found in Gu Hongzhong’s Night Revels of Han Xi Zai, in the collection of the National Palace Museum in Beijing (acc. no. 8813). The incorporation of this technique shows a high level of proficiency in traditional Chinese visual-language and painting styles.

At the lower register of the painting, three diminutive figures are depicted in various poses. The figure on the left is a portly figure, representing a martial guardian deity. The two figures to his right, with their dark skin and grotesque appearance, are portrayed similarly to “barbarians” in Chinese arhat paintings. One is depicted holding a large golden plate filled with food offerings, and the other presents a cylindrical mandala offering. To the right of the throne, two female figures fold their hands in veneration to the king. The sky is unpainted, leaving the raw cloth to evoke the ethereal qualities of the mist, a feature common to Chinese landscape painting. Negative spaces are fundamental to Chinese painting and have always been a major part of the artistic and philosophical ethos. They play the role of an amplifier, accentuating and framing the works by means of absence, rather than presence.

The painting is rendered in the style of Khyentse Chenmo, syncretizing the ornamental finesse of Tibetan traditions with stylistic elements and motifs from Chinese paintings. Khyentse Chenmo was an artistic genius who flourished from the 1450s to the 1490s. He was famed for his fine realistic depictions of his subjects and for his radical rejection of the prevailing, classic Indian and Nepalese-inspired styles with formal red backgrounds, enthusiastically replacing them with the vibrant greens and blues of Chinese landscapes. Khyentse Chenmo is the earliest Tibetan artist to have genuine historical documentation to establish a correlation between his historical existence and extant works of art attributed to him. Furthermore, Khyentse Chenmo's works and Khyenri have their distinctive and innovative aesthetic characteristics, despite the diversity in their subject matter and media. In this respect, the virtuoso artist Khyentse Chenmo and his art constitute an aesthetic revolution in Tibetan art history. Compare the painting stylistically with fifteenth-century arhat paintings in the style of Khyentse Chenmo published in David Jackson’s A Revolutionary Artist: Khyentse Chenmo, New York, p. 256. Compare also the details on the hanging banners, floral motif on the cushion and the prabha on the present work with a painting of Phagpa as Teacher of the Path and Result illustrated in David Jackson’s A Revolutionary Artist: Khyentse Chenmo, New York, p.170.

An eighteenth or nineteenth century painting (HAR #7571) based on the same composition as the present work survives in Palpung monastery in Eastern Tibet as illustrated by Tashi Tsering in “Si tu pan chen and His Painting Style: A Retrospective,” Journal of the International Association of Tibetan Studies, Issue 7, August 2013, p. 176, fig. 14. Given that the Palpung painting closely follows the composition of the present painting, it was likely that it was painted as a copy of the present work. The Palpung painting is identified by Tashi Tsering as belonging to a set of 25 paintings sponsored by Ja sgo ma. The subject of the set is unknown, but it is possible that the set depicts the arhats along with other patrons and Buddhist deities.

Tian Chen 8-2022
Lot 417
Christie's Catalogue, New York, September 2022.