Style A-B. Finely cast and clad in a diaphanous sanghati draped over the left shoulder, the face with a downcast benevolent expression detailed with full lips under heavily lidded eyes, all under a sinuously arched brow. The hair worked in tight curls over the ushnisha and pushed away from the broad forehead by a thin, plain band. The metal with a dark patina and encrustations of cuprite and malachite.

Provenance: Piasa Auctions, 25 March 2016, lot 266 (sold for EUR 2,576 or approx. EUR 3,100 adjusted for inflation at the time of writing). PD Collection Paris, acquired from the above. A copy of the original invoice from Piasa Auctions, addressed to Mr. PD, accompanies this lot.
Condition: Wear commensurate with age, obvious losses, signs of weathering and erosion, filling, few hairlines, small cracks, and encrustations, all as expected. The bust fitted with a metal rod for mounting. The mounting with minor chips and losses along the edges.

Weight: 2,700 g (excl. stand), 7,555 g (incl. stand)
Dimensions: Height 28.5 cm (excl. stand), 42.5 cm (incl. stand)

Mounted to a modern stand. (2)

The U-Thong Style, a term used to identify bronzes of three successive chronological groups (identified by the scholar, A.B. Griswold as Styles A, B and C) between the late twelfth and fifteenth centuries, exhibits a blend of Mon, Khmer and other Southeast Asian influences that were maintained from prior workshops in the region. Most U-Thong-style images were relatively small in scale, particularly those in the earlier styles.

The designation of U-Thong is in itself somewhat obscure; although a Mon Dvaravati city-state of that name existed at the height of the Dvaravati period (from roughly the seventh to eleventh century), archaeological evidence suggests it was abandoned by the eleventh century. Instead, the appellation seems to have been in reference to King Ramathibodi, who founded the Ayutthaya kingdom in 1351 and who was also known as Prince U-Thong. Images of the Buddha designated as being in the U-Thong style thus refer to bronzes carried out in a distinct style developed prior to the founding of Ayutthaya, but which continued and was synthesized with the mainstream Ayutthaya Buddhist art that flourished after its rise to power. Its earliest stylistic impulses were a sophisticated amalgamation of the other regional styles of the time, including the Khmericized Lopburi kingdom and the Khmer Empire itself to the east, the Mon Haripunjaya kingdom to the north, and the kingdoms of Burma to the west.

The sculptures of the U-Thong style are most strikingly distinguished from other contemporaneous styles in the features of the face and details of the head and hair. The cranial protuberance on the top of the head, referred to as the ushnisha, is, in U-Thong Styles B and C, topped with a tall, flaming jewel. The hair is arranged in small, tight curls, in contrast to the larger “snailshell” curls found in the contemporaneous sculpture of Sukhothai. Additionally, the hair is separated from the forehead by a thin, plain band. In U-Thong Styles A and B, the band typically run straight across the top of the forehead. The face, with its heavy-lidded, downcast eyes, broad nose, and wide mouth with full lips, demonstrates the influence of earlier Khmer styles, including the Bayon of the thirteenth century, although in Style C these somewhat severe features are softened. The shape of the face, which in Styles A and B are almost rectangular, is in Style C closer to the more oval-shaped faces of contemporary Ayutthaya sculpture.

Literature comparison:
Compare a related figure of Buddha at the Moment of Victory, 14^th-15^th century, in the collection of the Walters Art Museum, accession number 54.2792. Compare a related U-thong style figure of Buddha, 12^th century, in the collection of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, object number 89-13-23.