H x W x D (overall): 79 x 57.5 x 31.6 cm (31 1/8 x 22 5/8 x 12 7/16 in)
Type:
Sculpture
Origin:
northern Xiangtangshan, North Cave, Hebei province, China
Date:
550-577
Period:
Northern Qi dynasty, Northern Qi dynasty
Label:
Half-human, half-animal monsters served as the bases of columns in Cave 7 at Xiangtangshan, so visitors viewed the scultpures looking down upon them. The figures represent guardians of the Buddhist law.
Provenance:
Originally located in the North Cave, northern Xiangtangshan, Hebei province, China [1]
1936
An antique shop, Beijing, 1936 [2]
From 1939 to 1941
C. T. Loo & Co., New York, from at least November 1939 [3]
From 1941 to 1951
Eduard von der Heydt (1882-1964), Ascona, Switzerland, purchased from C. T. Loo on April 3, 1941 and lent to the Buffalo Museum of Science, Buffalo, New York [4]
From 1951 to 1964
US Government vested Eduard von der Heydt's property under the provisions of "Trading with the Enemy Act" by vesting order, dated August 21, 1951 [5]
From 1964 to 1973
National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, from March 1964 [6]
From 1973
Freer Gallery of Art, transferred from National Museum of Natural History on January 29, 1973 [7]
Notes:
[1] The removal of the sculpted figures and fragments from the Xiangtangshan caves began ca. 1909 at the time of political upheaval in China and continued throughout several decades, see http://xts.uchicago.edu/, accessed on November 9, 2009. See also J. Keith Wilson and Daisy Yiyou Wang, "The Early-Twentieth-Century 'Discovery' of the Xiangtangshan Caves," in Katherine R. Tsiang et al., Echoes of the Past: The Buddhist Cave Temples of Xiangtangshan, exh. cat. (Chicago: Smart Museum of Art; Washington, DC: Arthur M. Sackler Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 2010), pp. 106-129 and Katherine R. Tsiang and J. Keith Wilson, "Catalogue of Works in the Exhibition," in Katherine R. Tsiang et al., Echoes of the Past: The Buddhist Cave Temples of Xiangtangshan, 2010, pp. 182-183, cat. no. 12 (ill.).
[2] Mizuno Seiichi and Nagahiro Toshio illustrated the sculpture and described it as being in the possession of a Beijing antique shop in a publication based on a survey they had conducted in 1936, see Mizuno Seiichi and Nagahiro Toshio, Kyodosan sekkutsu [The Buddhist Cave-Temples of Hsiang-t'ang-ssu on the Frontier of Honan and Hopei] (Kyoto: Toho bunka gakuin Kyoto Kenkyujo, Showa 12, 1937), p. 105, pl. 6b.
[3] See C. T. Loo's stockcard no. 80954: "Two stone slabs, high relief decoration of monster, Wei," C. T. Loo & Frank Caro Archive, Musée Guimet, Paris, copy in object file. The sculpture was inventoried together with F1977.9 in November 1939.
On December 30, 1939, the sculpture was illustrated in an advertisement for An Exhibition of Chinese Stone Sculptures at C. T. Loo & Co. in New York, January 5-27, in Art News 38, 13 (December 30, 1939), back cover; see also C. T. Loo, An Exhibition of Chinese Stone Sculptures (New York: C. T .Loo and Co., 1940), cat. no. 30, pl. 23.
[4] See C. T. Loo's stockcard cited above.
The sculpture was sent by C. T. Loo directly to the Buffalo Museum of Science, see C. T. Loo's letters to Chauncey Hamlin, dated April 3, 1941 and April 9, 1941, Chauncey Hamlin Papers, Buffalo Museum of Science, Buffalo, New York, copy in object file. See also "Catalogue of the Von der Heydt Loan to the Buffalo Museum of Science: Loan Material from Baron Von der Heydt, as of March 1949," where the sculpture is documented together with F1977.9 under an inventory card no. 4151, copy in object file.
[5] See Vesting Order No. 18344, August 21, 1951, Office of Alien Property, Department of Justice.
Eduard von der Heydt exhausted all the legal remedies against the forfeiture of his property provided to him by the Trading with the Enemy Act.
[6] Attorney General, Robert Kennedy authorized transfer of the von der Heydt collection from Buffalo Museum of Science to the custody of the Smithsonian Institution in March 1964.
The collection was transferred to the National Museum of Natural History.
In 1966 US Congress legislated transferring the title of the von der Heydt collection to the Smithsonian Institution, see Public Law 89-503, 80 Stat. 287, July 18, 1966. The sculpture was accessioned under no. 448098 B, see "Smithsonian Office of Anthropology Accession Data," copy in object file.
[7] The sculpture was among 13 objects in the von der Heydt collection transferred from National Museum of Natural History to the Freer Gallery of Art, see "Smithsonian Institution Intramural Transfer of Specimens" memorandum, dated January 29, 1973, copy in object file.
It was accessioned to the Freer Gallery Study Collection under no. SC-S-10 in 1973 and subsequently accessioned to the permanent collection in 1977.
Collection:
Freer Gallery of Art Collection
Exhibition History:
Promise of Paradise (October 14, 2017 - ongoing)
Promise of Paradise: Early Chinese Buddhist Sculpture (December 1, 2012 to January 3, 2016)
Echoes of the Past: The Buddhist Cave Temples of Xiangtangshan (February 26, 2011 to January 6, 2013)
Chinese Art—Stone Sculpture (September 1, 1979 to March 14, 1982)
Untitled Exhibition, North Corridor (November 20, 1969 to December 11, 1984)
Chinese Art (January 1, 1963 to March 6, 1981)
Previous custodian or owner:
C.T. Loo & Company (1914-1948)
Baron Eduard von der Heydt (1882-1964)
National Museum of Natural History, Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution
