Eleven-Headed Guanyin (1100–1200): Art, History and Details

Eleven-Headed Guanyin (1100–1200) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The bodhisattva is an enlightened being dedicated to the spiritual awakening of all beings. The compassionate bodhisattva Guanyin, in a variety of manifestations, is probably the most popular deity of worship in Chinese Buddhism. In the Esoteric Buddhist form shown here, this standing Guanyin has a total of eleven heads, with smaller ones above the principal head. The uppermost head represents the Buddha Amitabha, to whom he is closely related. The eleven heads symbolize the Buddha’s steps on the path to enlightenment.

Object facts

• Title: Eleven-Headed Guanyin
• Date: 1100–1200
• Culture: China, late Northern Song dynasty (960-1127) - Jin dynasty (1115-1234)
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: wood with polychromy and cut gold
• Dimensions: Overall: 218.5 cm (86 in.)
• Collection: China - Song Dynasty
• Department: Chinese Art
• Accession number: 1981.53

A detail from the museum

This Guanyin is carved from a single block of willow (genus Salix sp.).

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc., New York. Chinese Objects of Art. 19 October 1944. Lot 229.
• Sotheby's New York. Fine Chinese Ceramics, Works of Art and Paintings. 6 November 1981. Lot 50.
• Lee, Sherman E. “The Year in Review for 1981.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 69, no. 2 (February 1982): 39–82.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.