The Laughing Belly

Viewing notes

A viewer's written impression — not a buyer review or first-hand record

This fully golden figure is a big-bellied monk seated in open laughter. Bald-headed with large ears, his chest and round belly bared, he sits at ease on a dark armchair-form stand, one foot folded up and the other set on the ground. A string of prayer beads hangs from his right hand beside the knee, the left hand resting on the other knee, while his robe slips from the shoulder and gathers in smooth folds across the legs. The deep wood tone of the chair sets off the bright gold of the figure — one glowing, one steady. There is no distance in this statue at all: one look and you breathe easier and smile back. It belongs in an entryway, a living room, a tea room or on a shop counter — a welcoming face of joy, an everyday token of good fortune, suited alike to devotion, collecting and giving.