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

446 CEYLON AND SOUTH-EAST ASIA
mask-like character of these heads, seen especially
in the flatness of the definition of the planes
of the face, is quite un-Indian, and is perhaps to
be taken as an early indication of the Indonesian
genius in the fashioning of theatrical masks in
the modern period. The principal architectural
and truly Javanese elements of the building are
the placing of the entire structure on a raised
base or podium, and in the construction of the
walls in small blocks of local stone without mortar.
The superstructure was always erected on
the corbel principle. Neither in this nor in later
Javanese temples are pillars or columns employed,
and the entire structure has a completely
plastic and closed appearance. A distinctive
Javanese form of ornament appears on the
Dieng temples in the shape of a kirtimukha
lintel. This motif was to reach in later architecture
an enormous decorative complication.
The great period of building activity in
Middle Java came under the reign of the Sailendra
Dynasty in the eighth and ninth centuries,
when Java, Sumatra, Malaya, and Indo-China
were ruled by a race of kings of East Indian
origin. This period is marked by the introduction
of Mahayana Buddhism, and one of the
earliest temples at Kalasan was dedicated to
Tara in a.d. 778 [379]. The plan is that of the
cubical cella of the early Dieng types converted
into a Greek cross by the addition of four subsidiary
chapels. The temple is only an elaboration
of the box-like form of Candi Bhima with
the same emphasis on the horizontal in the form
of repeated string courses and projecting entablatures.
The sculpture is marked by a greater
elaboration of the characteristic Javanese kirtimukha
pediment and by the employment of
figure sculpture in shallow niches as a part of
the exterior ornamentation. Actually this temple
seems much closer to contemporary building in
Cambodia than to any Indian originals, and,
together with eighth- and ninth-century buildings
at Angkor, might be cited as the beginning
of a truly Indonesian style.
A somewhat different type of the temple
complex is represented by the ninth-century
shrine of Candi Sewu, in which a central temple
of roughly the same plan and elevation as at
379. Candi Kalasan, temple
IA
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