AN ILLUMINATED SUTRA PAGE WITH
BUDDHA UNDERNEATH THE BODHI TREE
KASHMIR OR WEST TIBET, 12TH/13TH CENTURY
Opaque watercolor and ink on paper.
7 3/4 x 9 1/4 in. (19.6 x 23.5 cm), irregular
Footnotes
克什米爾或藏西 十二/十三世紀 彩繪菩提佛陀圖經頁
In discussion of related manuscript pages, Pal writes, "These few illuminations are distinguished from both the East Indian and Nepali styles of manuscript illustrations not only by their distinctive figural forms and the use of shading but also by the luminous tonality, the intensity and the diversity of the colors, as well as the application of gold. Thus, there can be no doubt that the wealth of murals in Western Himalayan Buddhist temples and the surviving illuminations in Tibetan manuscripts recovered from the region together attest the existence of a discrete tradition of painting that bears a close stylistic kinship to the sculptures that have survived in the Valley and that both are expressive of the same aesthetic." (Pal, "A Painted Book Cover from Ancient Kashmir", on asianart.com, December 2008). Also compare an example in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Pal, Art of Tibet, Los Angeles, 1983, p.125, no.M1g).
