110. * TANGKA REPRÉSENTANT LE PORTRAIT DE KANHA TIBET CENTRAL, MONASTÈRE DE NGOR, VERS 1600 Distemper on cloth; with original blue cloth mounts inscribed on the reverse along the top in Tibetan, identifying the painting's subject, and also with restored original red lacquered, gold painted dowel rod; verso inscribed in black ink with 'om, ah, hum' incantations behind each figure and many lines arranged into the form of a stupa, comprising Sanskritized and Tibetan prayers and mantras consistent with a formula repeated throughout the Ngor lamdre lineage set of paintings; recto with two separate lines of Tibetan inscription in gold along the bottom red painted border, the second identifying the secondary "Crooked Made Straight Lineage" sequence of figures within the painting, the first an homage to the central subject, translated: "With the profound advice, release my mind, Performing the benefit of others With the practice of vows; To Kanha, I bow." Himalayan Art Resources item no. 1443 Image: 74.5 x 62.8 cm (29 3/8 x 24 3/4 in.); With Silks: 124 x 66 cm (48 3/4 x 26 in.) A PORTRAIT THANGKA OF KANHA CENTRAL TIBET, NGOR MONASTERY, CIRCA 1600 藏中 俄爾寺 約 1600 年 坎哈巴肖像唐卡 Published: Marion Boyer, La peinture bouddhiste tibétaine, Paris, 2010, p. 132. Provenance: Private German Collection, acquired in Nepal, 1970s Michael Henss Collection, Zurich, acquired from the above in 2008 A frequent praise of the widely published Ngor lamdre lineage set of paintings that includes this portrait of Kanha is the insightful, nuanced capturing of each central subject's character and legacy. Here, the mahasiddha's soft wispy eyebrows and facial hair frame a calm, encouraging expression befitting Kanha's standing as the principal exponent of the lamdre tradition's 'gradual method'. He is one of the most popular of the 84 Indian tantric great adepts and his epithet (Tib. Nagpopa; "The Black One") is ascribed to numerous tantric teachings. Kanha occupies a prominent role in the lamdre tradition as the primary disciple of the tradition's first mortal master, Virupa. Before meeting Virupa, Kanha was a Hindu Shaivite yogin and upon the completion of his training was dispatched to convert a lustful Hindu king and court. The artist portrays Kanha cradling a human skull-cup (kapala) before his chest, which is a fairly ubiquitous attribute used when depicting the early Indian masters of Buddhist tantra. Similar to Kanha's own story, the kapala is rooted in Buddhism's repudiation of the Hindu caste system, its Brahmanical hierarchy, and its seemingly inflexible doctrine of spiritual evolution. The punishment for inadvertently killing a brahmin in Kanha's time was a severe ostracism in which the penitent was banished for twelve years to a desolate crossroads (like a charnel ground) and forced to beg for food with a human skull as an alms bowl, as well as the skull of the brahmin they had slain mounted on a wood staff as a banner (Beer, The Encyclopedia of Tibetan Symbols and Motifs, 1999, p. 249). A profound expression of Tantric Buddhism's antinomian nature, in which things that would be regarded as polluting in Indian culture are put to use to overcome dualities and transcend the fetters of existence, the kapala serves as a seminal ritual implement in tantric practice. Painted in royal-yellow swells, the artist depicts the elixir of immortality that tantric treatises (sadhanas) often say is contained within the inverted cranium. Kanha balances the kapala with effortless poise while articulating his fingers in the dharmachakrapavartina mudra of 'progressing the Dharma', which is likely another allusion to his role as the principal exponent of the 'gradual' lamdre method. Unlike the depiction of his disciple, Damarupa, or any other mahasiddha in the Ngor lamdre lineage set of c. 1600, Kanha's matted locks are piled up in the form of an ushnisha surmounted by a lotus-borne, wish-fulfilling gem (cintamani). This feature likens Kanha to the peaceful supremely enlightened Amitabha and Amitayus Buddhas located over his shoulders. Similarly, the painter clads Kanha in fine garments and jewelry that are essential features in the depiction of a buddha's samboghakaya form, its celestial 'reward body' resulting from advanced spiritual attainment. The delicate gold floral sprays patterning the crimson lower garment are redolent of luxurious embroidered silks. Nonetheless, the archetypal tantric trainee, Kanha, having achieved Buddhahood through tantric means, is bedecked, not in gold, but intricate lattices of human bone and a crown of dried skulls. Surrounding Kanha in formal rows along the top and side registers, are twenty-four successive masters of the 'Crooked Made Straight Lineage', one of the Sakya's traditional tantric teachings. Among the individual portraits is a secondary depiction of Kanha as this teaching's first mortal master, this time with flowers in his hair and blowing a sinuous trumpet made of an antelope horn. The depiction is in the same pictorial tradition as one of the other best-known thangkas of Kanha, now in the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond (91.518), which was produced at Ngor in a 17th-century style and represents the liberal adoption of China's landscape tradition after the monastery stopped patronizing the Newari Beri style. Among the other keenly recognizable portraits are that of Gayadhara, who brought the lamdre teachings to Tibet, dressed in a white robe and red pandita hat in the top register, and a debonair portrait of Dragpa Gyaltsen, one the Five Founding Fathers of the Sakya order (Jetsun Gongma Nga), pictured in the side registers sporting a gold speckled aqua robe, boots, and groomed white curls and facial hair. Across the bottom register, there is an exquisite array of classic and rare forms of Manjushri, the Bodhisattva of Infinite Compassion, sequenced from the important iconographical treatise, the Bari Gyatsa: The One Hundred Teachings of Bari Lotsawa Rinchen Drag (1040-1112). Starting bottom center and then alternating left and right to the edges are deities 7-13 in the Bari Gyatsa, representing Maha Raja Manjushri, Vidyadhara Pitaka Samskipta Manjushri, Ananga Vajra Manjushri, Dharmadhatu Vagishvara (Manjushri), Manjushri Namasangiti, Siddha Kavira (Manjushri), Manjushri Prajna Chakra. Above the last figure in the bottom right corner is the goddess White Tara, for whom Bari Lotsawa, the Bari Gyatsa's author, was one of the main lineage figures in the transmission of her tantras. Thus, we see that the figures and motifs used in this sensitive portrait from one of the most famous lineage sets are carefully chosen to convey specific teachings and insights. Finally, as the Hevajra Tantra and Chakrasamvara Tantras are the primary sources from which the lamdre teachings derive, a pair of multi-armed deities representing each tradition are represented either side of Kanha's ornate throne-back. The nearby repeated crimson Amitabha and Amitayus Buddhas lift the viewer's gaze along a curved register toward the tantric deities, up from Kanha's kind and encouraging set of hazel-brown eyes. Two Mahasiddhas from The Ngor Lamdre Lineage Set From The Michael Henss Collection The following two extraordinary paintings, depicting the Indian tantric mahasiddhas (great adepts), Kanha and Damarupa, belong to what is today the most famous set of portrait thangkas presenting a Tibetan Buddhist teaching lineage. Most of its dispersed members are now located between international museums, such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, and the Musée Guimet, Paris. The series was produced around 1600 in southern Central Tibet at Ngor monastery, which flourished under a superlative reputation for monastic discipline and tantric specialism. Each painting depicts a sequential master of the lamdre lineage, which is the Sakya tradition's essential teaching. These two portraits of Kanha and his student, Damarupa, from the collection of esteemed Himalayan art scholar and connoisseur Michael Henss, stand out as two of only four very rare mahasiddhas within the acclaimed set, injecting wild and transgressive elements into a sea of some thirty staid monastic hierarchs. The Ngor lamdre lineage series is highly regarded by art historians for, among other things, its vibrant palette, flawless brushwork, honed compositions, and deft portrayals of each central subject's psychological poise. It follows, therefore, that these two paintings also lay claim to being among, if not the best, Tibetan thangkas of Kanha and Damarupa in Western private collections or institutions. The lamdre tradition is the fundamental system of tantric practice for the Sakya order, which is one four major schools of Tibetan Buddhism. The teachings contain everything a practitioner of tantric meditation and yoga needs to attain complete enlightenment in a single lifetime, bypassing what would otherwise take eons through mainstream meditative practice. Meaning 'path with the result' or 'taking the result as the path', the lamdre tradition essentially provides a method for meditating, "not as a human being trying to become awakened but rather as one who is already enlightened. In so doing, one's 'path' (lam) becomes precisely the meditative simulation of the eventual 'result' (dre): the state of being a buddha" (Henry Rice & Durham, Awaken, 2019, p. 26). Ngor monastery, or Ngor Ewam Choden, was founded in 1429 by one of the Sakyas' most revered tantric scholars and practitioners, Ngorchen Kunga Zangpo (1382-1456). Located in southwestern Shigatse, Ngor became the heart of a dynamic Ngorpa subdivision within the Sakya school that attracted some of the brightest students of that generation. As Jackson writes, "They came from all over Tibet, wishing also to receive initiations and esoteric instructions from Ngorchen who was revered as Vajradhara in human form." (Jackson, The Nepalese Legacy in Tibetan Painting, 2010, p. 177). Ngorchen's abbatial successors continued after his death to uphold the founder's emphasis on strict monastic conduct and expertise in the lamdre tradition, first and foremost, as well as a canon of traditional Sakya tantric teachings. Such teachings are also represented throughout the Ngor lamdre thangka set in 'secondary' lineages in the top and side registers surrounding each central subject. Ngor's disciplined approach to monastic life finds expression as well, within carefully inscribed prayers on the back of each painting arranged into the shape of a stupa that are taken from the Pratimoksha Sutra, providing a monastic code of conduct. Ngorchen was also a prolific patron of the arts. With his initial employment of six talented Newars for a set of mandalas (HAR set no. 1212), he ushered in a new wave of Tibetan-sponsored Newari masterworks at Ngor, which lasted for more than a century and a half. The Newars are an ethnic group from Nepal's Kathmandu Valley who have been transmitting their artistic expertise across generations and are renowned for being among the most accomplished artisans in Asia. Ngor's abbots commissioned many outstanding thangka sets in the Newari 'Beri' style, characterized by its keen geometry, bold colors, and intricate scrollwork, well up until the lamdre lineage set under discussion was made c. 1600. Ngor thangkas of this period are widely regarded as some of the finest examples of Tibetan Buddhist art. One of the key features is their exquisite level of technical skill. The artists who created these works were highly trained in the traditional Newari painting techniques, including the use of ground mineral pigments, gold leaf, and intricate scrollwork. Under the supervision of both talented workshop masters and clergy, the painters paid meticulous attention to every aspect of their compositions, from the clothing and adornments of the figures to the delicate patterns and designs around them. The result is a body of work with a consistent level of precision and detail, breathtaking in its complexity, vibrant color, and symbolism, that is perhaps unrivaled in Tibetan art. The famous lamdre lineage series to which these two paintings belong represents the last-known major set of its type from Ngor in the Nepalese-inspired Beri style. The present pair of representative paintings prominently employ Nepalese decorative scrollwork and the late Beri palette, which features blues and greens. There is a marvelous choreography of color. The background of crisp scrolling vines enclosed by the gem-encrusted throne-back is an intense vermilion, sharply contrasting with the surrounding deep azurite blue behind it. Meanwhile, the scalloped edges of each mahasiddha's throne base show an awareness of contemporaneous Ming court furniture. Many consider this Ngor lamdre set to embody the late Beri style of Nepalese painting in Tibet par excellence. As Pal observes on the Damarupa: "There is no break with the past... [The] style is still full of life and vigor and the technical virtuosity admirable. [Central] figures are made especially animated with their expressive faces and flowing scarves and garments. The artists have also used a rich palette of scintillating colours, while the details are rendered with extraordinary restraint and sensitivity. [These] paintings reveal the subtlety of drawing and the effortless delineation of intricate patterns that were the hallmarks of the [Beri] style and of its source - the Newari aesthetic." (Pal, Tibetan Paintings, 1984, p. 72.) The set has been the subject of continuous study since its dispersal in the West in the 1960s. Approximately two-thirds of its thirty-some thangkas are published in some form. The frequent appearance of the 13th abbot of Ngor monastery, Namkha Palzang (1535-1602), as the last or penultimate master in many of the secondary lineages of each painting has led scholars to establish the dating of this set to during or shortly after his abbacy, i.e. 1569-1602 (see Jackson, Beri, p. 208; see Heller in Linrothe, p. 262 & 294-5 for diverging opinions). A compiled list of most of the known Ngor Lamdre thangkas (HAR set no. 385) can be found at www.himalayanart.org/search/set.cfm?setid=385. They are held in some of the most prestigious public and private collections, including: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Rubin Museum of Art, New York; Brooklyn Museum; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Virginia Fine Arts Museum, Richmond; Musée Guimet, Paris; Rjiksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, Leiden; Ethnographic Museum at the University of Zurich Museum der Kulturen, Basel; Tibet Museum, Alain Bordier Foundation, Gruyères The Zimmerman Family Collection; The Collection of Navin Kumar; The Collection of Barbara and Walter Frey; The Michael Henss Collection; The Suresh Neotia Collection. Three other paintings from the set, now in prominent private Chinese and American collections, sold recently at Sotheby's, New York, 20 March 2013, lots 237 & 238 and Bonhams, Hong Kong, 29 November 2016, lot 125. Greatly outnumbered by monastic figures in this set (by 4 to about 30), mahasiddhas like Kanha and Damarupa are among the most visually engaging and narratively entertaining subjects in Tibetan art. Mastering Tantra as a means to enlightenment, mahasiddhas specialize in the deliberate transgression of social norms and ordinary states of awareness, confronting and transmuting the most powerful human fears and desires. In pushing the boundaries of conventional behavior, they also push the boundaries of the ordinary world. Their skilled practice not only grants them supreme enlightenment, but also miraculous powers used to convert wrong-minded rulers and disrupt the unenlightened status quo. The Ngor lamdre lineage set was originally hung in a specific order, with the progression of masters expanding left and right centrifugally from the Primordial Buddha Vajradhara. (This is just as the secondary lineages appear in the top register of each painting.) As a sequential pairing of master and student, the fourth and fifth lamdre lineage holders, Kanha and Damarupa, would have appeared second on the viewer's right and left, respectively. Each mahasiddha sits on almost the same, highly distinctive lotus pedestal with thin, upswept alternating red and blue petals, which are remarkable in their precision. No other master in the known portion of the set shares this pedestal. Underneath Kanha and Damarupa, the petals do differ in a small but significant way: the tips of the very central petals point in opposing directions, with the more dominant deep blue central petal under Kanha pointing towards the viewer's right, and Damarupa's pointing to the viewer's left. Knowing where these paintings appear in the prescribed lineage, we can discern that the artists ingeniously directed each petal's orientation toward the central Vajradhara, which would have had a matching azurite body. This observation unlocks a remarkable aspect in the design of this famous set that has up until now been obfuscated through its displacement. The sequential arrangement of the paintings, consisting of left and right pairs with matching lotus thrones, amounts to an inspired orchestration across more than thirty individual works, in what is perhaps the greatest expression of the highly regarded precision and honed execution of the Ngor lamdre lineage set, and the clearest evidence of the supervision of a great master. This finding provides further testament to why this set and its constituent paintings, such as the present Kanha and Damarupa, are regarded among the great masterpieces of Tibetan art.   The backs of both paintings are blessed with the same inscribed combination of consecration mantras, invocations, prayers, and pious verses as the other paintings in the Ngor lamdre lineage set of c. 1600. Behind every figure in each painting is a consecratory "om, ah, hum", symbolizing the presence of the Buddha's body, speech, and mind within the icon. Longer verses in the form of a stupa behind the central figure are punctuated by dharanis inviting the living presence of the Buddhas as well as the protector and wealth deities Panjaranatha Mahakala, Shri Devi, Chaturmukha Mahakala, Vaishravana, Jambhala, and Vasudhara. The longer verses stem from the Vinaya and the Buddhist creed. For more information about the various elements within these inscriptions and the source for the following translation of the longer verses by the Rubin Museum of Art, see https://rubinmuseum.org/collection/artwork/sanggye-sengge-1504-1569. "Forbearing patience that bears hardships is the truest patience. Passing beyond suffering [nirvana] is supreme, said the Buddha. An ordained person who harms others or brings harm upon others, is not practicing virtue. Refrain from all misdeeds, practice virtue perfectly, discipline your own mind completely. This is the Buddha's teaching. The excellent vow of body, the excellent vow of speech, the excellent vow of mind: Monks who keep at all times all of the excellent vows will be liberated from all suffering. Of those phenomena produced from causes, the Tathagata has proclaimed their causes and also their cessation. Thus has spoken the great renunciant. May it be auspicious!"