Shanxi Yang Gao Yun Temple Eighteen Colorful Modeling Study

Throughout the Ming Dynasty, the development of Buddhist statues had begunto witness a general decline and their artistic level was no longer so exquisite as thatof their predecessors. However, endowed with the unique artistic features of arhatstatuary art in northern Shanxi province, the eighteen arhat statues at the YunlinTemple could be counted as one of the few finest sculptures in the Ming dynasty.Meanwhile, the sculptures, coming from the profound Chinese civilization, are thepriceless heritage from our ancestors, reflecting the unique national characteristics ofthe traditional Chinese culture and the local aesthetic taste. The colored eighteenarhat statues at the Yunlin Temple in Yanggao, Shanxi represent the national appealto deep and multiple aesthetic trend. The molding techniques have achieved a highdegree of integration of technology and art, form and content, images and ideas,reflecting the delicate,elegant aesthetic characteristics of the Ming dynasty.Moreover, the distinctive spiritual pursuit is also revealed through the local andhistorical features of the works which were made by pious people who had a hardlife in a closed-up environment. The statutes, as the mirror of the secularizationcourse of the Buddhist statue arts, is the excellent example of the arhat statues art inMing and Qing dynasties.By the analysis of the modeling concepts and techniques of the eighteen arhatstatues at the Yunlin Temple in northern Shanxi province, the thesis demonstrates thedistinctive features of the Buddhist statutes in this area, especially at the theperspective of sculpture modeling and visual aesthetics with the purpose of revealingtheir artistic value. The thesis, as the introduction to the modeling concepts, theimage characteristics, and the certain techniques, compares the Buddhist statues inother areas and reveals the unique features of the works discussed, analyzing thedifferences in sculpture modeling, techniques, visual experience and demonstratingthe unique artistic features of the eighteen arhat statues at the Yunlin Temple basedon the traditional Chinese sculpture arts. The thesis is written with the purpose ofproviding some kind of revelation to the studies on arhat statues at the YunlinTemple.