Mirror portraits: the sculpted art of the Virgin Mary and the bodhisattva Guanyin
Exhibition from February 13 to April 25, 2026 at IRFA-Missions Étrangères de Paris, 128 rue du Bac. 75007 PARIS.
Drawing on the collections of the Paris Foreign Missions Society, preserved at theIrfa Drawing on several private collections, this exhibition juxtaposes historical and previously unseen representations of the Virgin Mary for Christianity and the figure of the bodhisattva Guanyin for Buddhism. It will explore how their sculpted images circulated and were transformed within the Sinicized world, from the modern era to the 20th century.e century.
Although at first the portraits of the Virgin Mary and the bodhisattva Guanyin are distinctly formed, their symbolic packaging eventually breaks free from the mold of their respective traditions to better merge and surprise the viewer.
