id: 144961 accession number: 1970.156 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1970.156 updated: 2023-09-13 11:02:58.142000 Green Tara, c. 1260s. Central Tibet. Thangka; gum tempera, ink, and gold on sized cotton; painting: 52.4 x 43.2 cm (20 5/8 x 17 in.); overall: 107 x 65 cm (42 1/8 x 25 9/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund by exchange 1970.156 title: Green Tara title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: c. 1260s creation date earliest: 1250 creation date latest: 1270 current location: creditline: Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund by exchange copyright: --- culture: Central Tibet technique: thangka; gum tempera, ink, and gold on sized cotton department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art collection: Tibetan Art type: Painting find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS --- measurements: Painting: 52.4 x 43.2 cm (20 5/8 x 17 in.); Overall: 107 x 65 cm (42 1/8 x 25 9/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: inscription: translation: remark: inscription: Om Ah Hum translation: remark: inscription: om tare tutare ture svaha translation: remark: inscription: Om Ah Hum translation: remark: inscription: Om Ah Hum translation: remark: inscription: om ah sarva vyida svaha translation: remark: inscription: ye dharmā hetuprabhavā he- tuṃ teṣāṃ tathāgato hy avadat teṣāṃ ca yo nirodha evaṃvādī mahāśramaṇaḥ translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Year in Review: 1970 opening date: 1971-02-10T05:00:00 Year in Review: 1970. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 10-March 7, 1971). title: Object Lessons: Cleveland Creates an Art Museum opening date: 1991-06-07T04:00:00 Object Lessons: Cleveland Creates an Art Museum. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 7-September 8, 1991). title: Sacred Visions: Early Paintings from Central Tibet opening date: 1998-10-05T00:00:00 Sacred Visions: Early Paintings from Central Tibet. The Metropolitan Museum of Art (organizer) (October 5, 1998-January 17, 1999); Museum Rietberg, Zürich (February 14-May 16, 1999). title: Streams and Mountains Without End: Asian Art and the Legacy of Sherman E. Lee at the Cleveland Museum of Art opening date: 2009-06-27T04:00:00 Streams and Mountains Without End: Asian Art and the Legacy of Sherman E. Lee at the Cleveland Museum of Art. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (June 27-August 23, 2009). title: Stories From Storage opening date: 2021-02-07T05:00:00 Stories From Storage. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 7-May 16, 2021). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Main Asian Rotation (Gallery 239). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (November 18, 2013-June 30, 2014). * Main Gallery Rotation (Gallery 237). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (April 4-November 7, 2016). --- PROVENANCE The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1970- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: The tiny monastic figure under Green Tara's right hand commissioned the painting. digital description: For Tibetans, Green Tara is one of the preeminent figures of their Buddhist faith, a radiant savioress who embodies the female form of the perfect, enlightened mind. The Green Tara in the Cleveland thangka—a Tibetan devotional painting on cloth—specifically dispels fear and provides protection, just like her mantra inscribed on the back side of the painting. Her green color and fear-not gesture link her to the cosmic Buddha of the North, enshrined above her head. Most scholars agree that this work was painted by the celebrated Nepalese artist known as Aniko. wall description: This work of stunning refinement is in the Nepalese style of the early central Tibetan painting tradition. It is distinguished by its jewel-like use of color, delicate shading, exquisite detailing, and most of all a lilting, confident quality of the line drawing that imparts an unparalleled elegance and clarity to the overall composition. Some scholars attribute this painting to Aniko, a celebrated Newari artist who traveled from Nepal to Tibet during the 13th century. The central figure is a popular female emanation from the Buddha Amoghasiddhi who presides over the north and is green in color as well. Her left hand is held up in the gesture indicating that she is a source for transmitting Buddhist teachings, and the stem of a blue lotus winds gracefully through her fingers. Her hair is arranged asymmetrically with a big bun over her left shoulder and long loose curls falling behind her right. Delicate curls of hair are arranged symmetrically over her forehead. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Lee, Sherman E. "The Year in Review for 1970." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 58, no. 2 (1971): 22-71. page number: Mentioned: no. 70, p. 157 url: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25152361 The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. page number: Reproduced: p. 297 url: https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1978/page/n317 Orientations, vol. 20, October 1989. page number: Reproduced: cover and fig. 17, p. 42 url: Rhie, Marylin M., and Robert A. F. Thurman. Wisdom and Compassion: The Sacred Art of Tibet. London: Thames and Hudson, 1991. page number: Reproduced: fig. 14, p. 51 url: Singer, Jane Casey. "Early Tankas: Eleventh-Thirteenth Centuries," Marg: A Magazine of the Arts (Sept. 1996), pp. 28-29. page number: Reproduced: fig. 11 url: Fisher, Robert E. Art of Tibet. London; New York: Thames & Hudson, 1997. page number: Reproduced: fig. 112, pp. 134-135 url: Cunningham, Michael R., Stanislaw J. Czuma, Anne E. Wardwell, and J. Keith Wilson. Masterworks of Asian Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998. page number: Reproduced: pp. 158-159 url: Kossak, Steven, Jane Casey Singer, and Robert Bruce-Gardner. Sacred Visions: Early Paintings from Central Tibet. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1998. page number: Reproduced: no. 37, pp. 144-146 url: https://libmma.contentdm.oclc.org/digital/collection/p15324coll10/id/101557 Kossak, Steven, Jane Casey Singer, Robert Bruce-Gardner, and Michael Henss. Geheime Visionen: frühe Malerei aus Zentraltibet [=Sacred visions : early paintings from Central Tibet]. Zürich: Museum Rietberg, 1999. page number: Reproduced: cat. no. 37, pp. 144-146 url: May, Sally Ruth, Jane Takac, and Barbara J. Bradley. Knockouts: A Pocket Guide. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2001. page number: Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 101, p. 91, 119 url: Blezer, Henk and John Ardussi, eds. Impressions of Bhutan and Tibetan Art: Tibetan Studies III. Leiden: Brill, 2002. page number: Reproduced: pl. 42 url: Czuma, Stanislaw, "Great Acquisitions and Southeast Asian Art at the Cleveland Museum of Art," Orientations (Jan/Feb 2005), vol. 36, no. 1. page number: Reproduced: pp. 86-87 url: Jackson, David Paul, and Christian Luczanits. Mirror of the Buddha: Early Portraits from Tibet: from the Masterworks of Tibetan Painting Series. New York: Rubin Museum of Art, 2011. page number: Reproduced: p 12, fig 1.8 url: Franklin, David and C. Griffith Mann. Treasures from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2012. page number: Reproduced: pp. 104-105 url: Cleveland Museum of Art. Museum Masters: 2016-17 Companion Guide. [Cleveland, Ohio]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2016. page number: Mentioned and Reproduced: P. 33 url: Cleveland Museum of Art. Masterworks on Loan: Celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the Cleveland Museum of Art: April through June 2016. [Cleveland]: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2016. page number: Reproduced: p. 22 url: "Stories from Storage." The Asian Art Newspaper: Monthly for Collectors, Dealers, Museums and Galleries 24, no. 5: 6-7. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: pp. 6-7 url: Mace, Sonya Rhie. “Asian Art: Green Tara and the Art of Protection.” Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 61, no. 1 (Winter 2021): 24. page number: Reproduced and Mentioned: P. 24. url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.156/1970.156_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.156/1970.156_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1970.156/1970.156_full.tif