In this day and age it is rare to find a Buddha figure that resembles those that once dotted the landscape of the Silk Road, originating in Eastern India and spreading throughout Asia. Thankfully, the Newari community of the Kathmandu valley have kept alive this tradition, based closely on iconographic ancient texts, and are able to produce near-identical Buddha figures as those that would have been found in the Pala Empire of Bengal, when Buddhism was in its golden age. This extremely well-made sculpture evokes such times of when the Dharma was on the rise globally, and it is crucially important to recognize the importance of skilled sculpture making in an era of commodification and decline of the sacred Dharma.
