Good as gold

A gold-coated wooden Buddha sculpture set a new world auction record for Japanese art when it was sold for $14,377,000 at Christie's in New York, according to Reuters.

The newly discovered sculpture of Dainichi Nyorai, the supreme Buddha, attributed to the sculptor Unkei, was bought by Mitsukoshi Department Store at Christie's sale of Japanese and Korean art on Tuesday.

"History was made today," said Katsura Yamaguchi, Christie's International Director of Japanese and Korean Art. "We witnessed enormous interest from clients worldwide who traveled from near and far to ... participate in this landmark sale."

The 70 cm seated Buddha is believed to be the work of Unkei, considered one of the great carvers of the early Kamakura period of the 1190s. Part of a family collection in the northern Kanto region, before which it was kept in a Tochigi prefecture temple in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, its existence was unknown until it was sold to a Buddhist dealer and then bought by the consignor.

Japan's culture agency had received a petition signed by more than 12,000 people who wanted the statue to remain in Japan, according to NHK.

Click here for NHK's Japanese news about the auction (200k Broadband connection required).

You can see more of Unkei's masterful sculptures in Kyoto and Nara.