{"id":472,"date":"2013-07-13T01:28:13","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:28:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=472"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:28:13","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:28:13","slug":"43-south-indian-bronzes-vol-17-the-hour-of-god-volume-17","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/17-the-hour-of-god-volume-17\/43-south-indian-bronzes-vol-17-the-hour-of-god-volume-17","title":{"rendered":"-43_South Indian Bronzes.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n


\nSouth Indian Bronzes*<\/font><\/b><\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\n                       
\nTHE<\/font><\/b> discovery of Oriental Art by the aesthetic mind of Europe is one of the
\nmost significant intellectual phenomena of the times. It is one element of a
\ngeneral change which has been coming more and more rapidly over the mentality
\nof the human race and promises to culminate in the century to which we belong.
\nThis change began with the discovery of Eastern thought and the revolt of
\nEurope against the limitations of the Graeco-Roman and the Christian ideals
\nwhich had for some centuries united in an uneasy combination to give a new form
\nto her mentality and type of life. The change, whose real nature could not be
\ndistinguished so long as the field was occupied by the battle between Science
\nand Religion, now more and more reveals itself as an attempt of humanity to
\nrecover its lost soul. Long overlaid by the life of the intellect and the vital
\ndesires, distorted and blinded by a devout religious obscurantism the soul in
\nhumanity seems at last to be resurgent and insurgent. To desire to live,
\nthink, act, create from a greater depth in oneself, to know the Unknown, to
\nexpress with sincerity all that is expressible of the Infinite, this is the
\ntrend of humanity’s future. A philosophy, a literature, an Art, a society which
\nshall correspond to that which is deepest and highest in man and realise
\nsomething more than the satisfaction of the senses, the desire of the vital
\nparts and the expediencies and efficiencies recognised by the intellect without
\nexcluding these necessary elements, these are the things humanity is turning to
\nseek, though in the midst of a chaotic groping, uncertainty and confusion.
\n   
\nAt such a juncture the value of Eastern Thought and Eastern Art to the world is
\naltogether incalculable. For their greatness is that they have never yet fallen
\naway from the ancient truth, the truth of the Soul; they have not gone out of
\nthe Father’s house to live on the husks of the sense and the life. <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*
\nBy O. C. Gangoly. Published by the Indian Society of Oriental Arts, Calcutta.
\nSold by Thacker, Spink and Co., Calcutta, and Luzac and Co., 46, Great Russell
\nStreet, London.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-274<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

and the body; they have always seen in the mind and body only instruments for
\nthe expression of that which is deeper and greater than its instruments. Even
\nintellect and emotion had for ,them only a secondary value. Not to imitate
\nNature but to reveal that which she has hidden, to find significative forms
\nwhich shall embody for us what her too obvious and familiar symbols conceal,
\nhas been the aim of the greatest Art, the Art of prehistoric antiquity and of
\nthose countries and ages whose culture has been faithful to the original truth
\nof the Spirit. Greek culture, on the other hand, deviated on a path which led
\naway from this truth to the obvious and external reality of the senses. The
\nGreeks sought to use the forms of Nature as they saw and observed them,
\nslightly idealised, a little uplifted, with a reproduction of her best
\nachievement and not, like modern realism, of her deformities and failures; and
\nthough they at first used this form to express an ideal, it was bound in the
\nend to turn to the simple service of the intellect and the senses. Mediaeval
\nArt attempted to return to a deeper motive; but great as were its achievements,
\nthey dwelt in a certain dim obscurity, an unillU11lined mystery which contrasts
\nstrongly with the light of deeper knowledge that in- forms the artistic work of
\nthe East. We have now throughout the world a search, an attempt on various
\nlines to discover some principle of significant form in Art which shall escape
\nfrom the obvious and external and combine delight with profundity, the power of
\na more searching knowledge with the depth of suggestion, emotion and ecstasy
\nwhich are the very breath of aesthetic creation. The search has led to many
\nextravagances and cannot be said to have been as yet successful, but it may be
\nregarded as a sure sign and precursor of a new and greater age of human
\nachievement.
\n   
\nThe Oriental Art recognised in Europe has been principally that of China and
\nJapan. It is only recently that the aesthetic mind of the West has begun to
\nopen to the greatness of Indian creation in this field or at least to those
\nelements of it which are most characteristic and bear the stamp of the ancient
\nspiritual greatness. Indian Architecture has indeed been always admired, but
\nchiefly in the productions of the Indo-Saracenic school which in spite of their
\nextraordinary delicacy and beauty have not the<\/p>\n

\nPage-275<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

old-world greatness and power of the best Hindu, Jain and Buddhistic work But
\nIndian sculpture and painting have till recently been scouted as barbarous and
\ninartistic, and for this reason that they have, more than any other Oriental
\nwork, deliberately remained im the extreme of the ancient symbolic conception
\nof the plastic Arts and therefore most entirely offended the rational and
\nimitative eye which is Europe’s inheritance from the Hellene. It is a curious
\nsign of the gulf between the two conceptions that a European writer will almost
\nalways fix for praise precisely on those Indian sculptures which are farthest
\naway from the Indian tradition, – as for instance the somewhat vulgar
\nproductions of the Gandhara or bastard Graeco-Indian school or certain statues
\nwhich come nearest to a faithful imitation of natural forms but are void of
\ninspiration and profound suggestion.
\n   
\nRecently, however, the efforts of Mr. Havell and the work of the new school of
\nIndian .artists have brought about or at least commenced something like a
\nrevolution in the aesthetic stand- point of Western critics. Competent minds
\nhave turned their attention to Indian work and assigned it a high place in the
\nartistic creation of the East and even the average European writer has been
\npartly compelled to understand that Indian statuary and Indian painting have
\ncanons .of their own and cannot be judged either by a Hellenistic or a
\nrealistic standard. More salutary still, the mind of the educated Indian has
\nreceived a useful shock and may perhaps now be lifted out of the hideous banality
\nof unaesthetic taste into which it had fallen. Whatever benefits the laudable
\nand well-meaning efforts of English educationists may have bestowed on this
\ncountry, it is certain that, aided by the inrush of the vulgar, the mechanical
\nand the commonplace from the commercial West, they have succeeded in entirely
\nvulgarising the aesthetic mind and soul of the Indian people. Its innate and
\ninstinctive artistic taste has disappeared; the eye and the aesthetic sense
\nhave not been so much corrupted as killed. What more flagrant sign of this
\ndebacle could there be than the fact that all educated India hailed the
\npaintings of Raja Ravi Varma, an incompetent imitation of the worst European
\nstyles, as the glory of a new dawn and that hideous and glaring reproductions
\nof them still adorn its dwellings? A rebirth of Indian taste support-<\/p>\n

\nPage-276<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

ing a new Indian Art which shall inspire itself with the old spirit while
\nseeking for fresh forms is now, however, possible and it is certainly a great
\ndesideratum for the future. For nothing can be more helpful towards the
\ndiscovery of that which we are now vaguely seeking, a new Art which shall no
\nlonger labour to imitate Nature but strive rather to find fresh significant
\nforms for the expression of the self.
\n   
\nIt is necessary to this end that the wealth of their ancient Art should be
\nbrought before the eyes of the people, and it is gratifying to find that an
\nincreasing amount of pioneer work is being done in this respect, although still
\nall too scanty. The book before us, Mr. O. C. Gangoly’s South Indian
\nBronzes, <\/i>must rank as one of the best of them all. Southern India, less
\nravaged than the North by the invader and the Vandal and profiting by the
\nhistoric displacement of the centre of Indian culture south- ward, teems with
\nartistic treasures. Mr. Gangoly’s book gives us, in an opulent collection of
\nnearly a hundred fine plates preceded by five chapters of letterpress, one side
\nof the artistic work of the South, – its bronzes, chiefly representing the gods
\nand devotees of the Shaiva religion, – for the Shaiva religion has been as
\nproductive of sublime and suggestive work in the plastic arts as has been the
\nVaishnava all over India of great, profound and passionate poetry. This book is
\na sumptuous production and almost as perfect as any work of the kind can be
\nin the present state of our knowledge.
\n   
\nThere are certain minor defects which we feel bound to point out to the author.
\nThe work abounds with useful quotations from unprinted Sanskrit works on the
\nrules and conventions of the sculptural Art, works attributed to Agastya and
\nothers; but their value is somewhat lessened by the chaotic system of transliteration which Mr. Gangoly has adopted. He is writing for all India and
\nEurope as well; why then adopt the Bengali solecism which neglects the
\ndistinction between the b <\/i>and the v <\/i>of the Sanskrit alphabet or
\nthat still more ugly and irrational freak by which some in Bengal insist on
\nsubstituting for the aspirate bh <\/i>the English v? <\/i>Even in these
\nerrors the writer is not consistent; he represents the Sanskrit v <\/i>sometimes
\nby b <\/i>and sometimes by v, <\/i>and bh <\/i>indifferently by v, vh <\/i>or
\nbh. <\/i>Such vagaries are discon-<\/p>\n

\nPage-277<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

certing and offend against the sense of order and accuracy. It is always
\ndifficult to read Sanskrit in the Roman alphabet which is entirely unsuited to
\nthat language, but this kind of system or want of system turns the difficulty
\nalmost into an impossibility. We hope that in the important works which he
\npromises us on Pallava Sculpture and South Indian Sculptures Mr. Gangoly will
\nremedy this imperfection of detail.
\n   
\nThe first chapter of the letterpress deals with the legendary origins of South
\nIndian art. It is interesting and valuable, but there are some startlingly
\nconfident statements against which our critical sense protests. For instance,
\n"it is beyond doubt <\/i>that the two divisions of the country indicated
\nby the Vindhya ranges were occupied by people essentially different in blood and
\ntemperament." Surely the important theories which hold the whole Indian race to
\nbe Dravidian in blood or, without assigning either an "Aryan" or "non-Aryan"
\norigin, believe it to be homogeneous – omitting some islander types on the southern coast and the Mongoloid races
\nof the Himalaya, – cannot be so lightly dismissed. The question is full of
\ndoubt and obscurity. The one thing that seems fairly established is that
\nthere were at least two types of culture in ancient India, the
\n"Aryan" occupying the Punjab and Northern and Central India, Mghanistan and perhaps Persia and distinguished in its cult by the symbols of the
\nSun, the Fire and the Soma sacrifice, and the un- Aryan occupying the East,
\nSouth and West, the nature of which it is quite impossible to restore from the
\nscattered hints which are all we possess.
\n   
\nAgain we are astonished to observe that Mr. Gangoly seems to accept the
\ntraditional attribution of the so-called Agastya Shastras to the Vedic Rishi of
\nthat name. The quotations from these books are in classical Sanskrit of a
\nfairly modern type, certainly later than the pre-Christian era though Mr.
\nGangoly on quite insufficient grounds puts them before Buddha. It is impossible
\nto believe that they are the work of the Rishi, husband of Lopamudra, who
\ncomposed the great body of hymns in an archaic tongue that close the first
\nMandala of the Rig-veda. Nor can we accept the astonishing identification of
\nthe Puranic Prajapati, Kashyapa, progenitor of creatures, with the father<\/p>\n

\nPage-278<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

of the Kanada who founded the Vaisheshika philosophy. It distresses us to see
\nIndian inquirers with their great opportunities simply following in the path of
\ncertain European scholars, accepting and adding to their unstable fantasies,
\ntheir huge superstructures founded on weak and scattered evidence and their
\nimaginative "history" of our prehistoric ages. There is better and
\nsounder work to be done and Indians can do it admirably as Mr. Gangoly himself
\nhas shown in this book; for the rest of the work, where he has not to indulge
\nin these obiter dicta, <\/i>is admi- rable and flawless. There is a sobriety and
\nreserve, a solidity of statement and a sort of sparing exhaustiveness which
\nmake it quite the best work of the kind we have yet come across. The chapters
\non the Shilpashastra and the review of the distribution of Shaivite and other
\nwork in Southern India are extremely interesting and well-written and the last
\nbrief chapter of criticism is perfect both in what it says and what it refrains
\nfrom saying. <\/p>\n

    Mr Gangoly’s collection of plates, 94 in number, illustrates
\nSouthern work in bronze in all its range. It opens with a fine Kalasamhara and
\na number of Dancing Shivas,. the characteristic image of the Shaivite art, and
\ncontains a great variety of figures; there are among them some beautiful images
\nof famous Shaivite Bhaktas. A few examples of Vaishnava art are also given. In
\na collection so ample and so representative it is obvious that there must be a
\ngood deal of work which falls considerably below the best, but the general
\nimpression is that of a mass of powerful, striking and inspired creations. And
\nthroughout there is that dominant note which distinguishes Indian art from any
\nother whether of the Occident or of the Orient. All characteristic Oriental Art
\nindeed seeks to go beyond the emotions and the senses; a Japanese landscape of
\nsnow and hill is as much an image of the soul as a Buddha or a flame-haired
\nspirit of the thunderbolt. Nature will not see herself there as in a mirror,
\nbut rather herself transformed into something wonderfully not her- self which
\nis yet her own deeper reality. But still there is a difference, and it seems
\nto lie in this that other Oriental Art, even though it goes beyond the
\nexternal, usually remains in the cosmic, in the limits of Prakriti, but here
\nthere is a perpetual reaching beyond into something absolute, infinite, supernatural,
\nthe very<\/p>\n

\nPage-279<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

ecstasy of the Divine. Even in work not of the best finish or most living
\ninspiration there is this touch which gives it a greatness beyond its actual
\nachievement; rarely indeed does the statuary fall into mere technique or
\ndescend entirely into the physical and external.
\n   
\nIt is this tendency, as the author well explains, which causes and in a sense
\njustifies the recoil and incomprehension of the average Occidental mind; for it
\ncomes to Art with a demand for the satisfaction of the senses, the human
\nemotions, the imagination moving among familiar things’. It does not ask for
\na god or for a symbol of the beyond, but for a figure admirably done with
\nscrupulous fidelity to Nature and the suggestion of some vision, imagination,
\nfeeling or idea well within the normal range of human experience.\u00b9 The Indian
\nartist deliberately ignores all these demands. His technique is perfect enough;
\nhe uses sculptural line with a consummate mastery, often with an incomparable
\ncharm, grace and tenderness. The rhythm and movement of his figures have a
\nlife and power and perfection which conveys a deeper reality than the more intellectualised
\nand less purely intuitive symmetries and groupings of the European styles. But
\nthese bodies are not, when we look close at them, bronze representations of
\nhuman flesh and human life, but forms of divine life, embodiments of the gods.
\nThe human type is exceeded, and if sometimes one more
\nsubtly and psychically beautiful replaces it, at other times all mere
\nphysical beauty is contemptuously disregarded.
\n   
\nWhat these artists strive always to express is the soul and those pure and
\nabsolute states of the mind and heart in which the soul manifests its essential
\nbeing void of all that is petty, transient, disturbed and restless. In their
\nhuman figures it is almost always devotion that is manifested; for this in the
\nShaiva and Vaishnava religions is the pure state of the soul turned towards
\nGod. The power of the artist is extraordinary. Not only the face, the eyes, the
\npose but the whole body and every curve and every detail aid in the effect and
\nseem to be concentrated into the<\/p>\n

\u00b9 This was the traditional standpoint, the view of Art dominant at the time of
\nwriting but, though it still survives, it is no longer dominant. Art and
\naesthetics in Europe have swung round to an opposite extreme.<\/font><\/p>\n

\nPage-280<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

\nessence of absolute adoration, submission, ecstasy, love, tender- ness which is
\nthe Indian idea ‘of bhakti. <\/i>These are not figures of devotees, but of
\nthe very personality of devotion. Yet while the Indian mind is seized and
\npenetrated to the very roots of its being by this living and embodied ecstasy,
\nit is quite possible that the Occidental, not trained in the same spiritual culture,
\nwould miss almost entirely the meaning of the image and might only see a man
\npraying.
\n   
\nThe reason becomes evident when we study the images of the gods. These deities
\nare far removed indeed from the Greek and the Christian conceptions; they do
\nnot live in the world at all, but in themselves, in the infinite. The form
\nis, as it were, a wave in which the whole ocean of being expresses itself. The significance varies; sometimes it is unfathomable thought, sometimes the
\nself-restraint of infinite power, sometimes the self-contained oceanic surge of
\ndivine life and energy, sometimes the absolute immortal ecstasy. But always one
\nhas to look not at the form, but through and into it to see that which has
\nseized and informed it. The appeal of this art is in fact to the human soul for communion with the divine Soul and not merely to the understanding, the
\nimagination and the sensuous eye. It is a sacred and hieratic art, expressive
\nof the profound thought of Indian philosophy and the deep passion of Indian worship.
\nIt seeks to render to the soul that can feel and the eye that can see the
\nextreme values of the suprasensuous.
\n   
\nAnd yet there is a certain difference one notes which distinguishes most of
\nthese southern bronzes from the sublime and majestic stone sculptures of the
\nearlier periods. It is the note of lyrism in the form, the motive of life,
\ngrace, rhythm. To use the terms of Indian philosophy, most art expresses the
\nplay of Prakriti; Buddhistic art in its most characteristic creations expresses the absolute repose of the Purusha; Hindu art tends to combine the
\nPurusha and Prakriti in one image. But in the earlier stone sculptures it is
\nthe sublime repose, tranquil power, majestic concentration of the Deity which
\nthe whole image principally represents even in poses expressive of violent
\nmovement; the movement is self-contained, subordinated to the repose. We find
\nthe same motive in some of these bronzes, notably in the wonder-<\/p>\n

\nPage-281<\/font><\/p>\n

\n

ful majestically self-possessed thought and power of the Kalasamhara image of
\nShiva (Plate I); but for the most part it is life and rhythm that predominate
\nin the form even when there is no actual suggestion of movement. This is the
\nmotive of the Natarajan, the Dancing Shiva, which seems to us to strike the
\ndominant note of this art; the self-absorbed concentration, the motionless
\npeace and joy are within, outside is the whole mad bliss of the cosmic
\nmovement. But even other figures that stand or sit seem often to represent only
\npauses of the dance; often the thought and repose are concentrated in the head
\nand face, the body is quick with potential movement. This art seems to us to
\nreflect in bronze the lyrical outburst of the Shaivite and Vaishnava devotional
\nliterature while the older sculpture had the inspiration of the spiritual epos
\nof the Buddha or else reflects in stone the sublimity of the Upanishads. The aim
\nof a renascent Indian Art must be to recover the essence of these great motives
\nand to add the freedom and variety of the soul’s self-expression in the coming
\nage when man’s search after the Infinite need no longer be restricted to given
\ntypes or led along one or two great paths, but may at last be suffered to answer
\nwith a joyous flexibility the many-sided call of the
\nsecret Mystery behind Life to its children.<\/p>\n

\nPage-282<\/font><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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