A FINE TAIZÔKAI MANDARA

Description:

Japan, Muromachi period
142 x 93 cm R.
Taizôkai mandara (Womb world mandala). Ink, colours and gold on paper. Glazed and framed. Its structure consists of twelve courts, the central one being in shape of an eight-petalled lotus blossom showing the five Buddhas of esoteric knowledge (at the centre Dainichi Nyorai) and four Bodhisattvas. The surrounding courts display Buddhas, myôô, and more Bodhisattvas. The outermost court on all four borders of the mandala shows an assembly of beings who inhabit the three worlds of desire, form, and formlessness. All together there are 414 figures.
Old German private collection, acquired at Sotheby's New York, 19.12.1980, lot 4
The Taizôkai mandara states that everything that exists is ultimately an expression of Buddha's great compassion and that this compassion represents the womb (taizô) of being. [...] Here the unfolding of the Absolute into the different realms of existence is shown in the form of the lotus blossom in the central field. The other eleven zones (courts) indicate the temporally synchronous radiation of the Absolute into all areas of existence. (R. Goepper, Shingon, exhibition-cat., Cologne 1988, p. 152).
Minor wear, partly minor folds, framed under perspex