A BACTRIAN MARBLE COLUMN IDOL, LATE 3RD TO EARLY 2ND MILLENNIUM BC

A BACTRIAN MARBLE COLUMN IDOL, LATE 3RD TO EARLY 2ND MILLENNIUM BC
Published
: Massimo Vidale, Treasures from the Oxus: The Art and Civilization of Central Asia, page 50, fig. 46.
Oxus Civilization. The column of waisted form flaring towards the ends, the top and base with a crescent-shaped central groove. The stone of dark brown marble with white veins, and stress lines filled with calcite.
Provenance
: Axel Vervoordt Art & Antiques, Antwerp, Belgium. Paolo Bertuzzi, acquired from above in 2003. A copy of the original invoice addressed to Mr Paolo Bertuzzi, dated 28 February 2003, and stating a purchase price of EUR 4,100 or approx.
EUR 6,500
(adjusted for inflation at the time of writing), accompanies this lot. Axel Vervoordt (born 1947) is a Belgian antiques and art dealer, collector, and interior designer. He founded his company in Antwerp in 1969, and in 1998, he and his family acquired an industrial site which they turned into a small green town that offers spaces for art and exhibits works by renowned artists such as Anish Kapoor, James Turrell, Marina Abramovic, Otto Boll, and Tatsuo Miyajima. Vervoordt further designed several spaces for, among others, Robert de Niro, Kim Kardashian, and Kanye West. Paolo Bertuzzi (1943-2022) was a fashion stylist from Bologna, Italy. He was the son of Enrichetta Bertuzzi, founder of Hettabretz, a noted Italian fashion company with customers such as the Rothschild family, Audrey Hepburn, and Elizabeth Taylor. Paolo Bertuzzi later took over his mother's business and designed exclusive pieces, some of which were exhibited in the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum in New York, USA. He was also an avid collector of antiques for more than 60 years. His collection includes both archaic and contemporary art, and he edited two important books about Asian art, Goa Made - An Archaeological Discovery, about a large-scale archaeological project carried out with the Italian and Indonesian governments, and Majapahit, Masterpieces from a Forgotten Kingdom.
Condition
: Very good condition commensurate with age showing expected old wear and traces of use, some obvious losses, chips, and natural fissures.
Weight: 5,320 g
Dimensions: Height 25.5 cm
The Oxus Civilization
or Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex (BMAC), recently dated to c. 2250-1700 BC, is the modern archaeological designation for a Bronze Age civilization of Central Asia, previously dated to c. 2400-1900 BC, by Sandro Salvatori, in its urban phase or integration era. Though it may be called the “Oxus civilization”, apparently centered on the upper Amu Darya (Oxus River) in Bactria, most of the BMAC's urban sites are actually located in Margiana (modern Turkmenistan) on the Murghab river delta and the Kopet Dagh mountain range. There are a few later sites in northern Bactria (c. 1950-1450 BC), the territory of southern Uzbekistan, but they are mostly graveyards belonging to the BMAC-related Sapalli culture. A single BMAC site, known as Dashli, lies in southern Bactria, the territory of northern Afghanistan. Sites found further east, in southwestern Tajikistan, though contemporary with the main BMAC sites in Margiana, are only graveyards, with no urban developments associated with them. BMAC sites were discovered and named by the Soviet archaeologist Viktor Sarianidi when he was excavating in northern Afghanistan between 1969 and 1979. Sarianidi's excavations revealed numerous monumental structures in many sites, fortified by impressive walls and gates. Reports on the BMAC were mostly confined to Soviet journals. A journalist from The New York Times wrote in 2001 that during the years of the Soviet Union, the findings were largely unknown to the West until Sarianidi's work began to be translated in the 1990s.
Several stone objects of this shape
have been excavated at sites of the Oxus Civilization. However, it is still unknown what purpose they once fulfilled. It is suggested that these miniature columns at some point entered the rituals of the Oxus funerary practices, having previously performed a practical function that involved strong laces running around and causing intensive wear to the grooves. The present object belongs to a group of shorter, heavily polished columns with one central groove along the top and bottom.
Auction result comparison:
Type: Closely related
Auction: Sotheby's New York, 22 October 2003, lot 464
Price: USD 6,600 or approx.
EUR 9,900
converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing
Description: A Bactrian marble ritual object, 3rd millennium BC
Expert remark: Compare the closely related form and color of the stone. Note the larger size (38.1 cm).