Featured Carved Bone Goddess Statue

Carved bone statue of a goddess, but I cannot figure out which one. She has 3 faces and 18 arms. Measures 15" tall and is 9" wide.

 

Durga?

 

ohhhh she's handy !!!

 

Are you sure thats not resin?

 

Is she all one piece? Or are the arms, etc., separate pieces attached to the main body? My initial impression is also that she is resin, meant to look like ivory.

 

Kali, the destroyer of evil.

It seems to me that there would be considerable technical difficulty casting something like that with the undercuts and piercings, unless the suggestion is that it is hand carved from resin.
In which case, regardless of material, it would be something of a tour de force of carving skill.

 

I went with Durga rather than Kali because she looks more pacific, not holding a severed head or anything that way. The Chinese do some amazing things with resin. See this Kwan Yin.

This spot where it appears to be chipped doesn't look like natural material:



This is instructive, even without reading it all: https://www.realorrepro.com/article/Ivory-genuine-fake--confusing

 

It's gorgeous!

 

Just an uneducated guess- perhaps she is Ushnishavijaya ? She always has three faces, but the 8 hand number isn't right. Arms seem to come on go on some of the other Hindu dieties, so I don't know if that is a hard and fast rule. https://www.himalayanart.org/items/663

 

Yoohoo! @Any Jewelry

 

Stunning if real, heat up a pin so it's red hot and then see if it goes in to the figure on the bottom, if it doesn't go in and leaves a very small black mark then it's ivory.

 

Hi 808 raver,
Please do NOT suggest people use the hot pin test for ivory. If it is not ivory, it could flash and burn causing all kinds of problems. Any type of cellulose could cause tragic endings. More pieces of collectable stuff have been ruined by the hot needle test. The same is true of filing into pieces to see if they are silver or plated.
greg

 

I must have been asleep all this time, I certainly slept through all this.

It is Guanyin, but very close to the original Avalokiteshvara she was based on. Guanyin is a fusion of the Buddhist Bodhisattva of mercy Avalokiteshvara (male), and a pre-Buddhist Chinese Goddess. A Bodhisattva is an aspect of the Buddha.
Avalokiteshvara is called "the one with a thousand arms and a thousand eyes", to reach out to all those in need. The many faces serve to see and hear all suffering.
Although this Guanyin is based on Avalokiteshvara, according to Chinese tradition Guanyin was given "a thousand arms" by the celestial Buddha Amithaba to save people from Samsara, the cycle of rebirth. She is the guardian of sailors.

I have never seen the Hindu Goddess Kali/Durga (two sides of the same Goddess) portrayed in a Chinese style and with Chinese characters. There are few Hindus in China, and as far as I know, their religious objects were made in the traditional Hindu style and with Sanskrit script.

It looks like resin to me as well. Besides, objects that look like bone or ivory but have that grey 'stuff', are generally resin.

 

My Dad was an Optician, he and my Brother often used to soften glasses frames made of cellulose over an open flame, admittedly if they were left too long they would combust but using a hot pin in my experience just doesn't have the thermal energy to ignite cellulose. I have used the hot pin test many times to identify ivory without causing any more damage than a tiny black dot, if this is done in a place that can't be seen then personally I don't see the problem. I would never recommend filing silver but if they are going to get silver tested then it will have to be damaged in some way to check.

 

Wow, lots of responses, sorry for the delay in getting back to the thread. I do not believe that this is ivory, but I still think it may be bone.

The grey areas are actually just dirt, I am adding photos of the areas I have started to clean, and there is quite a difference. This lady is going to get a nice long soak in the tub, as there are just so many small areas. This came out of the house of a hoarder, who was quite dirty n also a smoker. I hate to say it but this piece is just plain filthy.

I have also included some close-up photos of the base. perhaps that will give someone with more knowledge a better idea if it is really bone or not. There are also 2 blue marks on the inside of the base I did not notice before.

 

Hi,
Looking at the bottom the areas of what looks like "fringe" are areas where the plastic is reveled from the casting. It is a beautiful statue but cast resin is my best answer as the same from other lookers. If bone it would have multiple tiny "dots" of where blood vessels would be seen interring and exiting the bone.
greg

 

The one thing it does not look like is bone. I really do recommend the article at the link in post #7.

 

Thanks for all the information. Just wishful thinking on my part about it being bone I guess.

 

Happens to all of us from time to time.