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

28 PREHISTORIC AND EPIC PERIODS
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'realistic' portrayal of many forms of nature in all
periods of Indian art. The divine is thought of as
present in man and in nature, present in the
same way that the number one is present, though
invisible, in two, three, four, and five. It is the
Indian belief that man's preoccupation with
practical ends and the understanding of practical
behaviour over-emphasizes the material
world. It is the aim of all the Indian religions -
Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain - to break from these
barriers in order to know the divinity directly.
The methods of attaining the desired union
with the divinity are infinite, and of these the
one most important for art is the method of
idolatry, the systematic creation of forms and
symbols to represent the manifold invisible
powers and mysteries of the supernatural
world. The technique that grew up as a result
of this necessity to express the unknowable
qualities of the divine was both symbolic and
anthropomorphic. Human effigies or diagrams
could be used with equal convenience for representing
the deity, since the human mind can
apprehend the deity only through such images.
The icon is, indeed, a diagram meant to express
a definite religious concept, and never intended
as the likeness or replica of anything on earth.
The symbol is perfect in proportion to its ability
to communicate the ultimate truth that it embodies.
When they were shown in anthropomorphic
shape, the Indian gods were portrayed as supermen,
fashioned according to canons of proportion
intended to raise the beauty of the idol
above the accidental beauty of any one human
being. In the same way the images of manyarmed
gods are purely mental creations that
have no counterpart in nature. Their multiple
arms are necessary for the deities simultaneously
to display the various attributes of their
powers and activities. The supreme purpose of
these images, as of all images in Indian art, is to
present the believer with all the truths which he
accepts and with all beings with whom he must
obtain communication through prayer. There is
nothing corresponding to idolatry in the narrow
sense, since the worship is never paid to the
image of stone or brass, but to what the image
stands for, the prototype. The image, in other
words, as a reflexion of the godhead, is as the
diagram of the geometrician in relation to the
great diagram in the beyond. The images in
Indian art are first and foremost objects of
utilitarian use, made by a process of contemplation,
and intended to help the worshipper in
communicating with the object of worship.
The persistence of magical symbolism and
tradition in modern India may be illustrated by
the combination of elements in the Indian flag.
The solar wheel in the centre is at once an emblem
of the ancient solar cults and the Wheel of
the Buddha's Law dominating all regions traversed
by the rolling wheel of the sun itself. The
three stripes of the flag incorporate the three
gunas, the threefold aspect of the one, the
Brahmin worship of the sun at dawn, noon, and
sunset, the three Vedas, etc.
Although the Indian artist's performance is
seemingly rigidly prescribed by the traditions of
religion and craft, he was not without the quality
which we describe as imagination or feeling.
This quality is described by the term rasa, which
may be translated as taste or joy or emotion. It
is the reaction induced in the beholder of a work
of art by the artist's manipulation of the feelings
which formed the original inspirational centre
of his consciousness in his vision of a certain
aspect of the universe. It is the artist's aim to
produce his own abstract or universal experience
in art and communicate this experience
to the beholder. The artist does not know that
his work will produce rasa, nor does he care.
He is so much in love with his theme that he
dedicates himself to the best of his training and
ability to render it from the sheer abundance of
his feeling, and, if the work is properly imbued
with the creator's feeling, the beholder will
share the artist's experience of rasa. If he has the