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

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320. Harihara from Prasat Andet.
Phnom Penh, Musee Albert Sarraut
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Andet near Sambor [320]. Although certain
details, notably the cylindrical head-dress and
piercing of the ears for earrings, are reminiscent
of Indian sculpture from the Later Andhra and
Pallava Periods, the statue, perhaps more than
any other single work of Cambodian sculpture,
gives the impression of an original autonomous
creation. As Coomaraswamy puts it, 'The
Cambodian figure exhibits a miraculous concentration
of energy combined with the subtlest
and most voluptuous modelling. Works of this
kind are individual creations - not, that is to
say, creations of personal genius unrelated to
the racial imagination, but creations of a unique
moment.' 7 Partly this suggestion of 'energy'
is
imparted by the way in which the weight is
distributed, so that the god seems about to move
into the steps of a dance; it is in a sense very
much the same type of balance and alternation
of thrust that characterizes the Diadoumenos of
Polyclitus. Not only the shape of the headdress,
but even more the minimal working of
the sculptural surface, the suggestion of plastic
volume in almost abstract terms, remind us of
the perfection of the carvers of ancient Egyptian
art.
Early Brahmanic figures, like the Harihara
and the torso of either Krishna or Lokesvara in
the Stoclet Collection in Brussels [321], have a
wonderful athletic litheness about them, a feeling
of resilient inner vitality. In contrast to the
general simplification of the surface is the
precise definition of details of drapery and
textile patterns. 8 Characteristic of this first
period of Cambodian sculpture are the eyes,
represented entirely open, and the full lips with
only a slight suggestion of the smile so typical of
Khmer sculpture of later periods.
2. THE CLASSIC PERIOD:
EARLY PHASE (80O-I000)
In so far as it is possible to conclude on the basis
of contemporary Chinese accounts, the first
kingdom of Funan disintegrated in a period of