Arts and Crafts of Temple Campus

Truth is great, no doubt, but man cannot live by truth alone; he requires benevolence. But even truth and benevolence are not sufficient, beauty too is required. Thus it is the triple-flame of Satyam the truth, Sivam the good and Sundaram the beautiful that enlightens, rectifies and delights the human life respectively. Of this effulgent triple-flame of the true, the good and the beautiful, the last has been the first impulse of man from time immemorial. Thus the beautiful, which has been the veritable source of all art, had unfolded itself even in the cave-dwelling primitive man of the Palaeolithic or the Old Stone Age.

The temples, especially in India, have been sacred shrines of not only the anthropomorphic deities but also diverse arts and crafts of aesthetic appeal. Even the external appearance of a temple is a visual epic in stone and stucco! In both ancient and medieval India the temples had been the infinite sources of not only devotional inspiration but also artistic creation. In those times there was little distinction between what were called the sacred and the secular, the material and the spiritual, the erotic and the esoteric. It was an integral and synthetic approach to life’s summum bonum. Both the sophisticated urban culture and the unostentatious rural creativity had found their concrete expression in the form and content of the temple.

It is a great surprise to find the modern surrealistic trends in ancient images in the temples. Surrealism is an abnormal art ex­pression emanating out of the subconscious world, which has made its manifestation in the twentieth century poetry as well as painting and sculpture. The imagination of the artists of yore was able to create such abnormal forms of surrealistic art. The images of Narasimha (semi-human and semi-animal), Brahma with four heads, Ganesha with the head of an elephant, Mahishaasura mardini with ten arms are a few of the many surrealistic art examples of temple sculpture of India.

All arts can, in general, be divided into two - temporal and spatial. Temporal arts, which depend upon time, are auditory arts while spatial arts, depending on space, are generally visual arts. Music, Poetry and allied arts are temporal arts; painting, sculpture, etc., are spatial arts. In the South Indian temples, formerly equal significance used to be paid both to the temporal or auditory arts and the spatial or visual arts. But later on in these temples, auditory arts receive greater prominence than the visual arts. This is not to state that greater prominence should be given to visual arts than to the auditory ones; this is meant that equal prominence should be given to both of them. Musicians and dancers, painters and sculptors should equally be treated.

The T.T. Devasthanams have to be cordially congratulated by every artist, artisan, art-lover, connoisseur and common man alike for taking the initiative to bring into existence the S.V. Kala Peetham, which, it is hoped, would become a glowing centre of all arts and crafts, both creative and performing, spreading light and delight in the urban and rural areas alike. The Kala Preetham’s task should be not only to revive the forgotten ancient and medieval traditional temple arts and crafts but also to give impetus to new creative and perfoming talents latent in young men and women. Renovation of the old is noble, no doubt, but innovation of the new is nobler.

Temples ought to pay special attention to schemes of unfolding and patronising the talents of rural artists and artisans, who are by no means less dextrous, if not more dextrous, than their urban brethren. There are, in the obscure corners of the villages, talented, yet unknown painters, sculptors, potters, weavers, wood carvers, metal casters, fabric printers, doll makers; leather-puppet makers, rare ivory carvers, etc., who suffer from poverty due to lack of proper patronage. The craft of making temple lamps, lamp-holders and lamp-stands in the media of brass, bronze and other alloys is an accomplished art by itself. Various enchanting designs, shapes and ornamentations of these temple lamps emerge out of the rhythmic movements of the deft hands of these unsophisticated village craftsmen! It is indeed an aesthetic delight to, watch these craftsmen at work in the process of which the amorphous raw material would culminate into forms enchanting! These craftsmen make their creations alive by infusing into them their own life!

Temples should encourage not merely the arts and crafts to be utilised by the temples but also those that are not useful for temples. The scope of temple arts and crafts has to be widened liberally. A temple campus has to become a rich museum-cum-art gallery in which are displayed various objects of arts including paintings, sculptures, handicrafts etc., irrespective of the themes they represent. The pilgrims visiting the temples should return to their homes, carrying within them the aesthetic impressions received from the art-creations present in the temple-campus, along with their inspiring memories of their divine emotions felt in the presence of the deities in the shrines.

The temple campus should be utilised for not only displaying the arts and crafts but also conducting art seminars, symposia on art and art festivals which awaken in the common men, women and children the art-consciousness both in its creative and appreciative aspects. Such lively zeal for production as well as enjoyment of arts and crafts would be more powerful and popular if they are organised in the temple campus than done elsewhere.

Mere display of the finished products of art and handicrafts in the temple campus is not enough. People should enjoy the modus operandi as to how a painting is painted, how a sculpture is sculpted, how a pot is wrought on the potter’s wheel, how a fabric is printed upon, etc. Such activities enlighten the public as to the unusual processes, methods and techniques of the execution of art-products. Hence such demonstrations of the modus operandi of works of arts and crafts have to be organised in the campus of the temples.

Eventually it is hoped that the atmosphere of the temple campus would vibrate with the rhythm of form and the tune of colour produced by the urban as well as the rural artists and artisans whose aesthetic aspirations turn into creative inspirations.