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Bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara
Not on view
Multi-armed forms of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara were favored in Buddhist worship in the Malay Peninsula and western Indonesia—territory broadly defined in the late first millennium as being under the suzerainty of the Srivijayan kingdom. Three spectacular large-scale examples are known, all eight-armed; two were found in the peninsula—at Chaiya (cat. no. 166) and Perak (cat. no. 157), respectively—and one in Sumatra. Here the bodhisattva holds in his ten radiating arms the objects that define his powers. The cult of Avalokiteshvara clearly enjoyed special favor in western Indonesia at this time.
cat. no. 161
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