Mongolia Winter Palace, Tara (师兄求图）

肃火斤

  The image of Tara is from a set of Twenty-one Taras belonging to the collection of the Winter Palace Museum in Ulan Bator, Mongolia. The full set of figures includes the twenty-one figures of Tara along with a large central Tara accompanied by Marichi seated on the proper right and Ekajati on the left. There are a total of twenty-four figures.

The Marichi figure currently belongs to the Rubin Museum of Art. Three or four of the figures from the Twenty-one Taras are also missing from the set. One of the Tara figures appeared at a Sotheby's New York auction in March of 2010.

Note that the flower on the proper right side has been broken off and lost as has the jewel top of the vase held in her right hand. (Compare with other figures from the set).

(See the catalog: Sotheby's, Indian & Southeast Asian Art, New York, 24 March 2010. Lot 71, Tara).