id: 147571 accession number: 1973.70 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1973.70 updated: 2022-01-13 10:03:15.098000 The Bodhisattvas of the Ten Stages in Attaining the Most Perfect Knowledge; The Eight Hosts of Deva, Naga, and Yakshi, 1454. China, Ming dynasty (1368–1644). Pair of hanging scrolls; ink and color on silk; overall: 140 x 79.5 cm (55 1/8 x 31 5/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund 1973.70 title: The Bodhisattvas of the Ten Stages in Attaining the Most Perfect Knowledge; The Eight Hosts of Deva, Naga, and Yakshi title in original language: 等覺位十地菩薩; 天龍八部羅叉女衆 series: series in original language: creation date: 1454 creation date earliest: 1454 creation date latest: 1454 current location: creditline: John L. Severance Fund copyright: --- culture: China, Ming dynasty (1368–1644) technique: Pair of hanging scrolls; ink and color on silk department: Chinese Art collection: ASIAN - Hanging scroll type: Painting find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS --- measurements: Overall: 140 x 79.5 cm (55 1/8 x 31 5/16 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: inscription: 大明景泰五年八月初三日施 translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting opening date: 1981-02-10T05:00:00 Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting. The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art (November 7, 1980-January 4, 1981); The Cleveland Museum of Art (February 10-March 29, 1981); Tokyo National Museum (October 4-November 17, 1982); The Asia Society Museum, New York, NY (December 3, 1982-February 28, 1983). title: Latter Days of the Law: Images of Chinese Buddhism 850-1850 opening date: 1994-08-09T04:00:00 Latter Days of the Law: Images of Chinese Buddhism 850-1850. Spencer Museum of Art (August 9-October 31, 1994); Asian Art Museum of San Francisco (November 30, 1994-January 29, 1995). title: Taming Tigers and Releasing Dragons: Masterpieces of Chinese Buddhist Art – Chinese Gallery Rotation 240a, 241c opening date: 2019-02-08T05:00:00 Taming Tigers and Releasing Dragons: Masterpieces of Chinese Buddhist Art – Chinese Gallery Rotation 240a, 241c. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (February 8-August 11, 2019). title: Monk Artisans of the Joseon Dynasty opening date: 2021-12-06T05:00:00 Monk Artisans of the Joseon Dynasty. National Museum of Korea, Seoul, Korea (Republic of) (organizer) (December 6, 2021-March 6, 2022). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE Ming imperial collection [Jingtai era, 1450–1456] date: 1450-56 footnotes: citations: (Shunichi Yabumoto Co., Ltd., Tokyo, Japan, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art) date: ?-1973 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1973- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: The grandest of the Buddhist mortuary rites is the Water-Land (shuilu) ritual. This esoteric ceremony is conducted for the salvation of “all souls of the dead on land and sea.” The ostentatious ritual was performed for imperial ancestors and high officials from the Song (960–1279) to the Ming dynasties and drew large crowds. On the second day of the weeklong ceremony, paintings are hung in the inner altar.

These two scrolls belong to a set of 36 Water-Land ritual paintings that are the finest works of their types known from the Ming period. With their bright, opaque color and fine-line gilt decoration intact and unfaded, both paintings share a remarkable state of preservation.

In the upper right corner of each painting is an imperial seal and an inscription in gold reading: Donated on the third day of the eighth month in the fifth year of the Jingtai reign (1454) of the Great Ming. Written in ink in the lower left corner is the record that they were made on imperial order, probably to present them to the Da Longfu monastery in Beijing.

One scroll represents the Eight Hosts of Celestial Nagas and Yakshis as described in the Lotus Sutra. The other represents Bodhisattvas of the Ten Stages of Enlightenment undergoing the final processes toward Buddhahood. The sinuous curves of scarf and drapery, the layering of garments, and the minute detail all reflect the opulent visual atmosphere that surrounded the Ming worshipper in temples and spirit halls throughout the country. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS “The Year in Review for 1973.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 61, no. 2, 1974, pp. 31–79. page number: Mentioned: no. 200, p. 79; Reproduced; p. 67 url: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25152513 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. 348 url: https://archive.org/details/CMAHandbook1978/page/n368 Ho, Wai-kam, Sherman E. Lee, Laurence Sickman, and Marc F. Wilson. Eight Dynasties of Chinese Painting: The Collections of the Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, Kansas City, and the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1980. page number: Reproduced: pp. 153-154, cat. no. 131a-b url: Suzuki, Kei 鈴木敬. Chugoku kaiga shi [中國繪畫史 = A History of Chinese Painting]. Tōkyō: Yoshikawa Kobunkan, 1981. page number: Reproduced: p. 4, no. 5a and 5b url: Suzuki, Kei 鈴木敬. Chūgoku kaiga sōgō zuroku [中國繪畫總合圖錄 = Comprehensive Illustrated Catalog of Chinese Paintings], 第 1卷. アメリカ·カナダ篇 [= vol. 1 American and Canadian collections]. Tōkyō: Tōkyō Daigaku Shuppankai, 1982. page number: Reproduced: no. A22-012, p. 1-260 url: Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991. page number: Reproduced: p. 61 url: Barnhart, Richard M., Mary Ann Rogers, and Richard Stanley-Baker. Painters of the Great Ming: The Imperial Court and the Zhe School. Dallas, TX: Dallas Museum of Art, 1993. page number: url: Tōkyō Daigaku 東京大学. Kaigai shozai Chūgoku kaiga mokuroku [海外所在中国絵画目錄. アメリカカナダ編 = Catalogue of Chinese paintings in foreign collections: America and Canada]. Tōkyō: Tōkyō Daigaku Tōyō Bunka Kenkyūjo Fuzoku Tōyōgaku Bunken Sentā, 1994. page number: p. 63 url: Weidner, Marsha Smith, and Patricia Ann Berger. Latter Days of the Law: Images of Chinese Buddhism, 850-1850. Lawrence, KS: Spencer Museum of Art, University of Kansas, 1994. page number: Reproduced: cat. no. 25, p. 284 url: Weidner, Marsha, "Two Ming Ritual Scrolls as Harbingers of New Directions in the Study of Chinese Painting," Orientations (Jan/Feb. 2005), vol. 36, no. 1, p. 64 page number: Reproduced: p. 64 url: Wang, Chiang-Ling. "Weiderentdeckte Schatze: Drei Chinesische Thangkas im Ethnologischen Museum, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin." Baessler-Archiv 62: 117-136. page number: Reproduced: p. 129, fig. 15 url: Chou, Ju-hsi and Anita Chung. Silent poetry: Chinese paintings from the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2015. page number: Reproduced: pp. 211-217 url: Giuffrida, Noelle. Separating Sheep from Goats: Sherman E. Lee and Chinese Art Collecting in Postwar America. Oakland, California: University of California Press, 2018. page number: Reproduced: p. 154, fig. 86 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1973.70/1973.70_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1973.70/1973.70_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1973.70/1973.70_full.tif