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The Arts of Asia Magazine edition from January-February 2013 Tuesday, February 18, 2025
The Arts of Asia Magazine edition from January-February 2013 contained an article by Stephen Little, with pictures by Tim Siegert, titled Images of Buddha from the Michael Phillips Collection. It focused on the personal collection of well-known film producer Michael Phillips, whose films include The Sting, Taxi Driver, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind. He had been collecting Buddhist sculpture for four decades, beginning in the early 1970s, though as a bonus, his Larry and Sherry Phillips had become prominent dealers in Indian and Southeast Asian art too. He decided to collect examples from certain preferred periods and cultures, first in bronze and later in stone. He had the good fortune of having guidance from his parents in New York, and generous help and mentorship from the pre-eminent scholar Dr Pratapaditya Pal, who was at that time senior curator of Indian and SEA art at Los Angeles County Museum of Art. The Phillips collection of Buddhist art included works from the Indian subcontinent, the Himalayas, Southeast Asia, China and Japan, with works ranging from the 2nd to 12th centuries AD.
The article highlighted some of his collection from Cambodia. For example: ‘A magnificent pre-Angkorian Khmer sandstone head of a Buddha dates to the 6-7th century, and is the earliest work of Southeast Asian Buddhist art in the collection. Associated with the art style of Angkor Borei, it is clear from the subtle modelling of the face, the wide snail-like curls of the hair, the low ushnisha or cranial bump symbolizing the Buddha’s enlightenment, and the sensual modelling of the mouth that this image was strongly influenced by the earlier Amaravati style of Buddha’s image, from what is now the state of Andhra Pradesh in southern India. A second early Khmer sculpture is a seated sandstone Buddha, said to have been found in the Mekong Delta of southern Vietnam. Heavily influenced by the Indian Gupta style, the Buddha’s face has slightly Mon features, which suggest that it may reflect some influence from the early Mon Dvaravati culture in Thailand. The figure’s hands are in the dhyana-mudra symbolizing meditation.
The 10th century Khmer Koh Ker style, seen here in a striking stone head of a male deity, is defined by a group of sculptures that survive from the great building campaign of ruler Jayavarman IV, who ruled from 928 to 942 at his capital at Koh Ker. The head is masterfully carved, with subtle modulations in the planes of the face, and an elegant contrast between the polished stone of the skin and the slightly rougher stone of the crown, hair, sideburns and beard. The upper surface of the figure’s chignon is decorated with a beautiful lotus flower carved in low relief. While the figure may represent the god Vishnu, its lack of clear attributes makes any certain identification impossible. A figure of the dancing apsara, or heavenly maiden, is a good example of Khmer bronze work of the late Angkor period. This dancing figure of a celestial nymph can be dated to the reign of Jayavarman VII – the lithe dancer was cast in bronze over an iron armature, part of which can be seen within the broken right arm. It’s likely the figure formed part of a larger Buddhist shrine (suggested by the tenon emerging from its left foot). It is possible, for examples, that the athletic figure was originally part of a shrine of the multi-armed Tantric meditational deity Hevajra, in which case, she would be classified as a yogini (normally Khmer shrines to Hevajra contained eight separate yogini images dancing in a circle around the central deity).’ Phillips, as well as his parents, donated artworks to Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Norton Simon Museum as well as the Metropolitan Museum in New York. I’ve included a couple of other sculptures that were in his collection at one time or another.
Credit By :Andy Brouwer
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