Sui & Wei Dynasty Chinese Altar Figures
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GUEST:
They were obtained by my father when he was an Army prefecture commander in Himeji, Japan, during the occupation. He brought these back with him.
APPRAISER:
He evidently had somebody pointing him in the right direction, because they're both very nice images, but neither of them are Japanese.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
Yeah, they're both Chinese. The one over here, this image here, is an image of the historical Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha, and this is a very, very early piece. It's from the Wei period in China. And the Wei period is 386 to 535.
GUEST:
(laughs): Okay. That's amazing.
APPRAISER:
And you have the little stand that's underneath it, was probably put on in China in the 19th century to sell it, and it's just very, very elegant image. This image here is from the period called the Sui. And the Sui were the third period of unified China. And they lasted a very short period of time, but they set the groundwork for the Tang dynasty. And the Sui reigned only from 581 to 619, with only two emperors. And the style changes surprisingly quickly into a Tang style…
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
…that isn't like this. But this is an image of Buddha of the future, Maitreya.
GUEST:
Mon... Maitreya.
APPRAISER:
Maitreya.
GUEST:
Maitreya.
APPRAISER:
And it has a face in one hand, and then a willow branch in the other. These images, though they look like women, were actually men.
GUEST:
Mm-hmm
APPRAISER:
And they dressed in the style of Indian princes. So that's why you see the jewels, and the earrings, and everything like that.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
But now, the stand with this one may not have started life with the figure that's there.
GUEST:
All right.
APPRAISER:
However, the stand was made at the same period of time. Both these figures are gilt bronze.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
And the bronze basically in this is fire-gilt, where they take the actual gold and mix it with mercury and then fire it off, leaving the gold on the surface that they chase. The corrosion that's on this one is just the copper deteriorating. They're lost-wax castings. They'd make a wax model, a container for it, and then pour the bronze in, and get rid of the wax and then they'd be left with the image. There were probably hundreds of thousands of them originally.
GUEST:
Really?
APPRAISER:
But very few of them have survived. These would have been personal items of Buddhist worship. It would have been inside of someone's house, set up on a little altar with little flower vases, an incense burner, and used as an object of veneration within Buddhism. This one here, the Wei period, is, it's kind of plainer images, and it isn't that popular because it's a little plain. But still, at auction, that image would be, like, $5,000 to $7,000.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
This image being high-style Sui, and the gilding is in very, very good condition, this image here would be probably $10,000 to $12,000.
GUEST:
Fascinating. So the gilding is... adds to it.
APPRAISER:
Oh, it does, yeah, yeah. And usually, they're found scoured.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
Without a trace of gilding.
GUEST:
So don't touch it.
APPRAISER:
No, no. Leave the corrosion, everything that's on it.
GUEST:
Okay.
APPRAISER:
Don't clean it up.
GUEST:
All right, that's amazing.
APPRAISER:
But they're wonderful images.
GUEST:
I love them-- thank you so much.
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