This large Burmese image of Buddha Shakyamuni attributed to the 18th-19th-century was made using the hollow dry lacquer technique that originated in China and was well established in Burma by the 18th century. A core image or armature is first modelled in clay on a wooden base. It is then overlaid with strips of cloth impregnated with lacquer sap. They are then covered by a wash of fine ash and water, and a putty of lacquer sap and teak sawdust (thayo). The image is further molded and shaped, with final details finished separately and then attached. Once the outer layers of lacquer are dry, the inner clay core is removed. Finally, the outer image is sealed, coated with a refined lacquer mixture, polished, and gilded. The Buddha can sit on a lion throne, as here, or on a hexagonal pedestal.
Rather than being dressed in simple monastic robes, the Buddha wears the ornate garb of a Burmese king or a Universal Monarch (chakravartin) with patterned textiles embellished with winged elements on his shoulders, upper arms, and knees that are inlaid with clear, red, and green foil-backed roundels of glass. His layered waistcloth drapes over the front of the lion throne. He has a steep multitiered crown with a jewel finial and copious jewelry, including prominent winged earrings, multiple necklaces, and a chest ornament of high rank (sa-lwe). The Buddha’s right hand is extended in the gesture of calling upon the earth to witness his right to achieve Enlightenment after his many lifetimes (bhumisparsha mudra). His left hand rests on his lap palm upward in a gesture of meditation (dhyana mudra). He sits in the meditation posture (padma asana).
A comparable dry lacquer Burmese Buddha image is in the Asian Art Museum, San Francisco (2006.27.27). See Sylvia Fraser-Lu and Donald M. Stadtner, Buddhist Art of Myanmar (New York: Asia Society Museum in association with New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2015), pp. 178-179, no. 46.
