Art, Gothic and Indian

Indian art in all its spheres of craftsmanship has its own individual uniqueness, uncomparable in many respects to the Western art. It is the record of the racial, national, philosophical and religious experience of the people and serves the purpose of life for which India has stood from time immemorial. It is produced always in response to a demand, a demand arising not from without but from within. It is produced by master craftsmen following the tradition of the race; tradition in India is a living thing. Life is eternal and immortal; both the animate and the inanimate express it in accordance with their state of evolution and understanding. So also with art, whether it expresses itself in the form of architecture, sculpture, painting, music, dance or poetry. Indian tradition allows no barrier between the arts of the folk and the canonical arts, of fine arts and decorative arts. Art, according to ancient Indian teachers, is not for art’s sake but for the love of life, a life which leads humanity ‘From the Unreal to the Real, from Darkness to Light and from Death to Immortality.’

Always the motive is spiritual, a motive which stands in close relationship to the Gothic art of Europe. The theme is spontaneous, seeking to reveal the different aspects of the Infinite. Un-like Western art, Indian art has very little to do with the outer manifestation, either of nature or of any material artificiality. In Indian art there is greater expression of life and its psychic vivifications, and its supreme function lies in its distinctive power of suggestiveness. In representing a man, for example, Indian art sticks to a conception of man, a mental image of what the artist understands man to be, for, it is not human anatomy only in which he is interested; it is rather man, an idea, not a picture, which he strives to evoke in the mind of the spectator. The origin of art-sense, according to Indian tradition, is that this phenomenal universe is pervaded by an infinite energy (Sakti) which pours itself into every name (Nama) and form (Rupa) and in its more refined state generates in man a creative urge in response to which he develops his arts and letters.

Therefore the artist, according to ancient teachers, is the vehicle of divine expression. The One, for fulfilling His desire to be all-pervading, infuses in each and everyone an abundance of creative energy which in its turn demands release in the projection of finite forms. Thus the artist also makes the creation of a piece of art into a complete act of divine efflorescence. As such he creates a form, a name to proclaim to the world the glory of Divine Art. He has no other longing than to touch this divine source of life: his joy, and his bliss lie in this eternal search alone. ‘He forgets all, becomes overwhelmed with its Joy’ (Swami Vivekananada: ‘Prabuddha Bharata’ for 1933).

So we find him devoting his time and energy to his work of unveiling the Incomprehensible, the realm of the Unseen, the Eternal, and the Infinite, to bring down to earth something of the beauty of the things above. To manifest this Vision on earth in human form, even though it might be perfect and beautiful to the human eye, is inadequate, as His beauty and His divine nature are beyond all forms and names. ‘Meditating on the Ultimate perfection one could perceive some glimpses of the beauty of the God-head’ is his motto. So we find him never glorifying, like his brother in the West, bodily strength. According to the Indian artist, beauty could be perfected only by the surrender of all worldly attachments (Samsara) and the suppression of worldly desires (Vishaya). Therefore he seeks an idealistic, mystic, symbolic and transcendental form of the Divine Vision. The work before him is a gigantic one, like the landscape of his motherland, but he is never pessimistic over his task, as he has the resources of a poet, priest and philosopher in his very self. In this respect we can find a companion, a fellow pilgrim to him in the Gothic art. As a matter of fact, his Gothic brother is no stranger; is he not also on the same path to tackle the dynamic, divine consciousness in his creative art? Even though its form is the outcome of the Western environment, Gothic art-consciousness is universal. The Gothic artist is more emotional at times, more sentimental, but the Indian artist is not satisfied with these spheres of expression, as he considers them mere passing life’s streams. He goes beyond these; he appeals to the imagination and intuition (Buddhi, Jnana) and places, before us an abstraction of a superterrestrial sphere, rather than mere bodily griefs and sufferings.

In other words, the power of mind over matter ishis main motive. It is the great synthesis embracing many different theological and mythological elements which he exploits for his ideal. The idealism of the Vedas is the life and soul of Indian art. Always Indian art seeks the Himalayan vision and its eternal glories, for its motive, for its inspiration. ‘Him and Him only knowing, one crosseth over Death; no other path at all is there for him to go.” (Upanishad)

There are many peculiarities in Indian art, and in particular in Indian sculpture and other plastic arts, in comparison with the Gothic and other spheres of Western art. In Indian art, renouncement and bliss (Tyaga, Ananda) are perfectly tuned and in this connection it is an art most intimate and reserved, an ideal we can see to some extent in Gothic art. To appreciate any piece of Indian plastic or painting, one requires self-realisation as a necessary step and then alone, as in Indian Philosophy and Religion, one can understand and love its dynamic significance, symbolic and spiritual. Every gesture, every pose and sway springs in god-like fashion directly from the natural disposition of the mind.

Like its sister the Gothic, Indian art never allows any model, either for the representation of the divine personality or an earthly figure. It expects an inner, intuitive feeling (Samadharana) not an observation of an outer model in this respect. Even though technical perfection is an essential factor, Indian canons of art say they can be acquired through practice and they are a matter of skill and knowledge, but not of vitality.

All themes, as the Gothic ones, are impersonal. Hence the artist has full freedom to use his own imagination and intuition, his own ideas, transcending all man-made laws and regulations. As we have seen already, to an artist in India, an outer phenomenon, even though very attractive and fascinating, is a passing one, and as such, has brief duration; it is a surface effect. He knows this and sticks to the main conception, a conception which is infinite and eternal. This attitude towards all things seen and unseen has alone maintained him both through tradition and philosophy to follow his craftsmanship without a break from time immemorial. Many empires arose and disappeared, many a passing thing happened in the history of his land, but none of these things have ever destroyed his art-consciousness.

Further, he has pursued his craft undisturbed by any questionings as to the relative importance of this appearance or that as against his symbolical expression of ideas or emotions: while the Gothic and the other successive stages of art in the West have been experimenting either with the problem of optical illusion or the simultaneous and consecutive vision, the comparative strength of d straight line in relation to a curved line etc. Indian art says all it has to say by the use of a peculiar mastery of line and pure radiant colours. Unlike his co-workers in the West the artist had not to seek his public. The public is there to appreciate his universal language of the Divine; from north to south, from west to east, he is understood, he is honoured, an honour which at times even the monarchs envied.

Moreover, art in India, unlike the Gothic, is free from aristocratic aloofness, either in its overbearing, submissive or humorous representation. It is an outcome of an inner state, of innocence, of an unbroken sense of Being. (S. Kramrich: ‘Indian Sculpture.’ Pp. 101, 102). Whether it be compassion or resignation, itsheds to the outside world what it has seen within and without. An insoluble form is stated in definite and in a measured art form; the eternal form is shown in all its elaborateness and lavishness without fear or force. It is definite and full. In other  words it seeks to show us a state beyond our vision, beyond our perception, in all its manifestations and attributes. It is heroic and, at the same time, reserved and well-balanced.

Yet this art is profoundly naturalistic, but not in the sense one uses that word in Western art. Appearance for its own sake and as an end in itself is never made an object of study in Indian art. Surface things are naturally appreciated for their visible quality but the artist goes beyond this: he accepts them for further stimulation of his inner experience. He takes the visible world to correct his inner experience of nature. ‘It isinnervation, and at the same time transubstantiation.’ (S. Kramrich: ‘Indian Sculpture,’ Pp. 135, 136) All forms are homogeneous as they are brought about by movement and thus the manifold types are keenly observed and understood. Nature, according to tradition, though an active agency of man, reacts upon and impresses the seeker after Truth with the sense of the supernatural.

Time and space have no special role to play, like inwestern art. This does not mean that an Indian artist has either neglected or avoided this natural force of phenomena. He has taken them for granted like any other phenomena of the passing world; Further, to him all living forms and living beings are none but transformations of space-time. As the latter isvoid, it is opposed to life cosmic. Past and future are united in the present. The infinity of time is continued in the quiet of eternity. (H. Zimmer: ‘Journal of Indian Society of Oriental Art’ 1933) Further, Indian art is a vehicle, an immediate experience of the ‘Becoming’, of an inner life movement.