Zanabazar: Self-Portrait and Buddha Vajrasattva

Abstract

Introduction. Jebtsundamba Khutuktu Öndör Gegeen Zanabazar was Mongolia’s first ruler to hold both secular and spiritual power. In the late 17th century, the country witnessed dramatic internecine wars, and his overriding goal was to unify the nation and increase the educational level. Virtually all his self-portraits discovered depict Zanabazar as a real priest with iconographic markers of Buddha Vajrasattva. The selected Buddhist symbol is supposed to deliver a deepest nonverbal sermon and mysterious testament of the prominent Buddhist master. Goals. The paper seeks to further reveal, examine, and describe objects of artistic heritage authored by Öndör Gegeen Zanabazar and currently stored in state, public, administrative, and private collections of Mongolia and Russia. Results. The work is a first attempt to examine Zanabazar’s self-portraits — both sculptural and graphic ones (including tiny elements of different thangkas) — in their structural unity in the context of his meditative practices. The descriptions of the pictures compiled with due regard of Buddha Vajrasattva-related tantric texts and facts of Öndör Gegeen’s biography may be viewed as sources for historical and art studies in Vajrayana Buddhism. The analysis of textual and graphic materials attempts to interpret Zanabazar’s unique position as both a spiritual and Buddhist arts master.

Keywords

• figurative arts of tibetan-mongolian buddhism
• zanabazar’s self-portraits
• artistic traditions of central asian nomads
• specific features of mongolian images
• buddha vajrasattva
• personification and realism