Lockets, locks and longevity

David Leffman Uncategorized Leave a Comment

In 2018 I bought this antique child’s locket (鎖片) in Dali, an old walled caravan town in China’s Yunnan province. Today Dali has become a bohemian holiday retreat for China’s urban middle class, but from the seventh to the thirteenth centuries served as the capital of the Nanzhao and Dali kingdoms, whose borders reached from Tibet to Thailand, and at …

Pure Land Woodblock

David Leffman Buddhism, Dali, Uncategorized, woodblock, Woodblock print, Yunnan Leave a Comment

I bought this woodblock – the actual block, not a print – at a market in Dali, Yunnan. The title is “A Prayer for Rebirth in the Pure Land”, mantra for a popular Mahayana Buddhist sect. Prints would have been used in their thousands at local folk festivals. Centre top is Buddha seated on a lotus, flanked by strings of silver and gold …