The art and architecture of India - Buddhist, Hindu, Jain (Art Ebook)

244 THE GOLDEN AGE AND END OF BUDDHIST ART
covered with paintings; among the most unusual
details from this cave that we shall
examine are parts of the complete decoration of
the flat ceiling. Although the painted decoration
does not form a complete or unified iconographic
scheme, large portions are thought of as
parts of a single concept: the two colossal
painted figures of Bodhisattvas on each side of
the niche at the back of the hall may be regarded
as parts of a Trinity, with the sculptured image
of the Buddha in the sanctuary as the central
figure. Both these Bodhisattvas are of the carana
type of composition in which a principal figure
serves as stablizing factor and guide to the entire
arrangement; for example, on the left-hand wall,
the enormous figure of a Bodhisattva with a
Blue Lotus stands in a landscape teeming with
forms of all sorts, related not by any laws of
spatial composition but by their relation to the
object of their veneration, the Deity of Compassion
represented at the moment that he
manifests himself to this group of devotees. The
spectator does not take in the entire huge
composition at a single glance, but his eye,
following the directions suggested by the
gestures and movements of the forms, and always
returning to the dominating shape of the
Bodhisattva, comes gradually to explore and
apprehend the entire arrangement.
The figure of the Bodhisattva is worthy of
detailed analysis [183 and 184]. Following the
principle of hieratic scaling, it is enormously
larger than the attendant figures ; this device not
only serves an iconographical function but
provides a dominant vertical axis around which
the composition literally revolves. We may be
sure, that the form, just like the sculptured
Buddhist images of the period, was composed
according to a system of canonical proportion,
probably nine thalams to the total height of the
figure. The pose of the body with its pronounced
dehanchement contrives to impart a
feeling of swaying grace and movement that is
carried out in the exquisite tilt of the head and
the gesture of the hand. As an example of that
metaphorical rather than organic composition
of human forms, this figure has few equals. We
may see how feature by feature the parts of the
face and body are drawn with reference to the
shape of certain forms in the animal and
vegetable world, which by their beauty and
finality recommended themselves as more
fitting than any transitory human model for
creating the imagined superior and eternal anatomy
of a god: 15 the face has the perfect oval
of the egg; the brows curve as an Indian bow;
the eyes are lotiform. We recognize again the
elephantine shoulders and arms, the leonine
body, and, perhaps loveliest of all, the hand,
which in its articulation suggests the pliant
growth of the lotus flower it holds.
It will be observed in the figure of the
Bodhisattva and his attendants that the flesh
parts appear to be modelled in light and shade.
Actually this chiaroscuro has nothing to do
with the recording of any effects of illumination;
like the highly similar modelling of
Trecento painters such as Giotto, its sole function
is to impart a feeling of solidity and
plasticity to the forms. In a completely arbitrary
way areas of shadow are placed on both sides of
the bridge of the nose of the Bodhisattva, and in
some of the dark-skinned attendants bold highlights
are painted on the saliencies of features
and body further to enhance the feeling of
existence in the round. In the examples at
Ajanta and elsewhere in India this abstract
shading has a much softer sfumato effect than in
the provincial Indian painting at Bamiyan,
where the technique is in process of becoming
a convention. 16
Here is 'an art that reveals life ... as an intricate
ritual fitted to the consummation of every
perfect experience'. :: In a marvellous reconciliation
of beauty, physical and spiritual, the Great
Bodhisattva is realized as the very embodiment
of that compassion and tenderness that his
mission of allaying the miseries of the world