Dance Images in Temples of Mainland Southeast Asia ... - Repository

previous sub-chapter, it is obvious that the vast majority of dance images examined in this study
belong to the (b) composite type. While iconography as a technique of analysis was originally
formulated for the study of European Renaissance art and has been applied since then mainly
in the western context 9 , this study deals with South and Southeast Asian traditional cultures
in periods when concepts such as “art” and “artist” were actually not known and consequently
these dance images in question were not “created by artists”.
In general terms, one could say that the dance images as well as the whole religious imagery
in Southeast Asia have been executed by craftsmen or groups of craftmen directed by one or
several “masters”. The iconography, iconometry and style of the imagery have been mostly
dictated by strict rules, sometimes recorded in model drawings or even manuals. The problem,
however, is that no such manuals prior to the early 19 th century have survived because of the
tropical climate and disastrous wars in Southeast Asia. On the other hand, in India, from where
most of the prototypes were received, such manuals exist.
In “traditional” cultures such as those discussed here religious art 10 was not a fi eld for selfexpression
in the sense it tends to be now in the West and westernised cultures around the
world 11 . On the contrary, the main purpose of religious images was to serve the demands set
by religious rituals and practices. Thus the craftsmen were bound to follow strict rules which,
however, could vary according to place and period. The iconography and style were deeply linked
to the doctrine of the prevailing religion or its particular sect. Moreover, when the craftsmen
executed images for the temples, it was the overall symbolism of the building which dictated
their subject matter, their iconographical details and their distribution in the sacred building.
When applying dance iconographical analysis to these kinds of Southeast Asian dance
images, it is inevitable that the analysis process becomes more complicated than when one is
dealing with images belonging to western culture. Thus this study aims to cover several contexts
within which the images should be interpreted. They include history, dance history, art history,
and what is very crucial, the history and symbolism of temple architecture.
So it is necessary that the already described “three-step” analysis technique of dance
iconography becomes more complex when it is applied to the Southeast Asian dance images
created for temples. In this study a “four-step” technique is therefore applied. This is dictated by
the fact that their temple and consequently the belief system contexts must be observed, too. The
outlines of this method and the major questions to be asked are as follows:
1. Recognising a dance image among other kinds of temple imagery
When studying Southeast Asian cultures and their bygone periods it is not always simple to
recognise which images are actually dance images. There are three major ways to do so:
– To use information gained by previous research
– To compare the poses, gestures etc. with present-day traditions of respective
cultures and regions
– To compare the image with the Indian prototypes which are already relatively well
studied
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