Guanyin of the Southern Sea
- 230
With an unknown dealer, possibly Celestin Liu, Peiping (modern-day Beijing), China, possibly by May 26, 1932 [1];
With C. T. Loo, Paris, by 1933-1934 [2];
Purchased from C. T. Loo by The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1934.
NOTES:
[1] In an unpublished memoir of Nelson-Atkins Curator of Asian Art and Director Laurence Sickman (possibly written at the time of Sickman’s death in 1988), Dr. Nicholas Pickard recalled things he and Sickman spoke about in Sickman’s final years. Pickard wrote: “Sickman first saw [the Guanyin] in the winter of 1932-33. It was in a dealer’s backyard because it was too large to place within the shop itself. There was snow on the ground and the dismembered pieces were lying about in the snow.” In fact, Sickman may have mentioned this sculpture to the Nelson-Atkins’s Advisor on Asian Art, Langdon Warner, as early as May 26, 1932, when he sent Warner a telegram: “Excellent wood MFA-type Kuanyin undamaged colored eight feet about two thousand plus shipping please wire reply.” The sculpture was being offered for sale by dealer Celestin Liu. According to a letter from Sickman to Director Paul Gardner, June 12, 1933, Sickman had sent a photo of the sculpture to Warner, wanting the museum to buy the piece, but Warner thought it was too expensive at the time. Regardless of whether Sickman’s first sighting of the piece was in May or later in 1932, he followed Warner’s recommendation and didn’t buy it. Unbeknownst to Sickman, however, the sculpture was subsequently acquired by the dealer C. T. Loo. According to Pickard, when Sickman arrived at the museum for its opening celebration in December 1933, “he was dumbfounded to find the Kuan Yin sitting in the temple [gallery]. The dealer in Peking had sold it to Mr. C. T. Loo who sold it directly to [the Nelson-Atkins].” See Sickman Vertical File and RG01/01, Office of the Director Records – Paul Gardner, box 5, folder 40, Nelson-Atkins Archives. See also Harvard University Pusey Library, Langdon Warner Personal Archive, HUG4872.1010, box 12, folder 20, copies in Nelson-Atkins curatorial file.
“Kansas City Nelson Gallery Buys Unique Kuan Yin Statue,” The China Weekly Review (April 7, 1934), 211 (repro.).
“The American Magazine of Art Including “Creative Art,” The American Federation of Arts, vol. XXVII, no. 8 (Washington: August 1934), frontispiece, 443 (repro.).
“Art News,” vol. 37 (December 3, 1938), 18-19 (repro.).
Laurence Sickman, “Notes on Later Chinese Buddhist Art,” Parnassus, vol. 11, no.4 (College Art Association, April 1939), 16, doi: 10.2307/771623 (repro.).
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 2nd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1941), 120, fig. 22, 121, fig. 23 (repro.).
Lin Yutang, “Lin Yutang’s Superb Panorama of the Wisdom of the Orient,” The Chicago Sun, vol. 1, no. 8, December 20, 1942, national edition, fifth section (repro.).
Regina Shoolman, Charles E. Slatkin, The Enjoyment of Art in America: A Survey of the Permanent Collections of Painting, Sculpture, Ceramics & Decorative Arts in American and Canadian Museums: Being an Introduction to the Masterpieces of Art from Prehistoric to Modern Times, 1st ed. (Philadelphia : Lippincott, 1942), pl. 161 (repro.).
The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, The William Rockhill Nelson Collection, 3rd ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1949), 156-157 (repro.).
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Judith Hart Burling, Chinese Art (New York: Studio publications in association with Crowell, 1953), pl. 243 (repro.).
Princeton University Record, vol. XII, no. 1 (1953), 23, pl. f18 (repro.).
Rene Grousset, Chinese Art & Culture, trans. Haakon Chevalier (New York, Orion Press 1959), pl. 49 (repro.).
Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 190 (repro.).
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Eric Newton, The Arts of Man (London: Thames and Hudson, 1960), 301 (repro.).
Michael Sullivan, An Introduction to Chinese Art (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1961, 1960), pl. 89 (repro.).
Eleanor C. Munro, The Golden Encyclopedia of Art; Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, and Ornament, From Prehistoric Times to the Twentieth Century. With a Glossary of Artists and Art Terms,” (New York, Golden Press 1961), 89, fig. 6 (repro.).
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Laurence Sickman, Alexander Soper, “The Art and Architecture of China,” (Baltimore: Penguin Books, 1960, 1956, 1971), pl. 79 (repro.).
Ross E. Taggart, George L. McKenna, and Marc F. Wilson, eds., Handbook of the Collections in The William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, Kansas City, Missouri, vol. II, Art of the Orient. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1973), 39 (repro.).
Apollo, special issue for the Asian art collection in the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Vol. XCVII, no. 133 (March 1973), cover, 38, pl. 11 (repro.).
Laurence Sickman. "Monsters and Elegance: Nine Centuries of Chinese Sculpture" Apollo (March 1973), 240-247 (repro.).
John Blofeld, Bodhisattva of Compassion, (Boulder: Shambhala, 1978), 246, pl. 11 (repro.).
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Ellen R. Goheen, The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1988), 168, no. 91 (repro.).
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Pratapaditya Pal, Icons of piety, images of whimsy : Asian terra-cottas from the Walter-Grounds Collection, (Los Angeles, California : Los Angeles County Museum of Arts, 1987), 75 (repro.).
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Petra Rosch, “Chinese wood sculptures of the 11th to 13th centuries: images of Water- moon Guanyin in Northern Chinese temples and western collections,” (Germany, Stuttgart: Ibidem-Verlag, 2007), cover picture, 372, fig. XVI (repro.).
Deborah Emont Scott, ed., The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art: A Handbook of the Collection, 7th ed. (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2008), 338, pl. 168 (repro.).
Ryusuke Asami, “Sculaptures of Zen,” Nihon-no Bijutsu, no. 507 (July 20, 2008) (repro.).
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