Kannon Bosatsu
12th/14th century
- Medium
- Wood with traces of polychromy
- Classification
- Sculpture
- Dimensions
- 83.9 × 36.9 × 36.9 cm (33 × 14 1/2 × 14 1/2 in.)
- Culture
- Japan
- Museum
- Art Institute of Chicago, Arts of Asia
- Credit line
- Samuel M. Nickerson Endowment
- Rights
- Public domain (CC0), as the museum states it.
- Who can see it
- Tweens profiles and older: its subjects are known and suit older children. How works are placed
View at the Art Institute of Chicago
About this work
This figure of Kannon, the bodhisattva of divine mercy and compassion, was originally part of an ensemble of three statues depicting the Welcoming Descent (raigo), in which the Amida Buddha and his attendants descend from the Western Paradise to welcome newly deceased souls. Here Kannon leans forward and extends a lotus pedestal (now lost), on which a soul would be carried into paradise. The idea of raigo was incredibly reassuring to Buddhist devotees, who, when close to death, used sculptures and painted images to imagine this journey to peace.
Description © Art Institute of Chicago, CC BY 4.0
