Ancient Indian Art South and Central Asia

Great Stupa at Sanchi. Madhya Pradesh, India Great Stupa at Sanchi. Madhya Pradesh, India. Buddhist; Maurya, late Sunga Dynasty. c. 300 B.C.E.–100 C.E. Stone masonry, sandstone on dome. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ap-art-history/south-east-se-asia/india-art/v/aam-stupa

The Great Stupa of Sanchi is an earthen mound, faced with stone, then stucco, then gilded. It is surrounded by carved stone fences and gates placed at the cardinal directions. The stupa is built on a reliquary that contains the cremated remains of the Buddha and is a representation of or diagram of the cosmos. The Stupa is a dome shaped mound, surrounded by a circumferential pathway constructed for circumambulation. The dome was composed of dirt and rubble, faced with dress stone, and sits on a raised base.  The Stupa is 120 feet across, excluding the railing and umbrella.

The Emperor Asoka converted to Buddhism, and went on pilgrimage The Emperor Asoka converted to Buddhism, and went on pilgrimage. He founded the first Stupa at Sanchi. He also created a supportive environment for Buddhism in India. The Stupa contains several chambers, which contains the relics of Buddha. The Stupa is surrounded by four gateways - ‘toranas’, which are intricately carved. The Stupa symbolized Buddha and eventually it became a symbol of his final release from the cycle of birth and rebirth - the Parinirvana or the ‘Final Dying.’ The three ‘parasols,’ set one above the other along the shaft, are located in the uppermost region of Sanchi Stupa. They represent a heavenly hierarchy.

On the stone carvings the Buddha was never depicted as a human figure. A torana is a type of gateway seen in the Hindu and Buddhist architecture of the Indian subcontinent. Toranas typically consist of two pillars carrying two or three transverse beams that extend beyond the pillars on either side. Strongly reminiscent of wooden construction, toranas are often covered from top to bottom with exquisite sculpture.    Toranas at the Great Stupa at Sanchi. The four gateways depict scenes from the life of Lord Buddha and Jatakas tales, the stories associated with Buddha and his earlier births. Yakshis are placed between the capitals and the crossbars. These are Indian female figures in a somewhat free-moving pose and one leg crossed behind the other. On the stone carvings the Buddha was never depicted as a human figure. Instead the artists chose to represent him by certain attributes, such as the horse on which he left his father’s home, his footprints, or a canopy under the Bodhi Tree where he attained enlightenment. The human body was thought to be too confining for the Buddha.

Buddha. Bamiyan, Afghanistan. Gandharan. c. 400–800 C. E Buddha. Bamiyan, Afghanistan. Gandharan. c. 400–800 C.E. (destroyed in 2001). Cut rock with plaster and polychrome paint. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/ap-art-history/west-and-central-asia/v/bamiyan-ten-years-on

Buddhism spread outward from India in every direction-west to Afghanistan. With it spread the Indian-Buddhist traditions in the arts. Mahayana Buddhism emerged in the first century CE as a more liberal, accessible interpretation of Buddhism. As the "Greater Vehicle" (literally, the "Greater Ox-Cart"), Mahayana is a path available to people from all walks of life - not just monks and ascetics (Mayana).

The sculptors at Bamiyan, Afghanistan, expressed the magnitude of the new Mahayana Buddhism with the creation of a series of colossal sculptures, the largest are between 120 and 175 feet tall. The main bodies were carved directly from the sandstone cliffs, but details were modeled in mud mixed with straw and then coated with stucco. This coating was painted to enhance the expressions of the faces, hands and folds of the robes. The lower parts of the statues' arms were constructed from the same mud-straw mix while supported on armatures made of wood. The upper parts of their faces were made from large wooden masks or casts. Rows of holes that can be in the rock and are believed to have held wooden pegs that stabilized the outer stucco (Wikipedia).

He wrote the following: A Buddhist monk named Xuanzang, famous for his seventeen-year overland journey to India, which is recorded in detail in the classic Chinese text Great Tang Records on the Western Regions, wrote about the Buddhas of Bamiyan. Xuanzang's work is the longest and most detailed account of the countries of Central and South Asia by a Chinese Buddhist pilgrim. While his purpose was to obtain Buddhist books and to receive instruction on Buddhism while in India, he recorded the cultures of the seventh century for posterity.   He wrote the following: ‘On a declivity of a hill to the northeast of the capital was a standing image of the Buddha made out of stone 140 or 150 feet high, of a brilliant golden color and resplendent with ornamentation of precious substances.” Photo Citation: "Xuanzang w". Licensed under Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

The Buddha was built some time between the third and fifth centuries. The largest was 57 meters high (the height of a 20 story building). There are total of three colossal statues carved 4,000 feet apart. The third is a reclining Buddha that has not been discovered yet. At one time, two thousand monks meditated in caves among the sandstone cliffs. The world’s earliest oil paintings have been discovered in caves behind the partially destroyed colossal statues. Scientists from the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility have confirmed that the oil paintings, probably of either walnut or poppy seed oil, are present in 12 of the 50 caves dating from the 5th to 9th century. The whole mountain surrounding the Buddha, is full of tunnels and it all leads to little chambers which the monks would have lived in and prayed in.

The sculptures were dynamited and destroyed in March 2001 by the Taliban, on orders from leader Mullah Mohammed Omar after the Taliban government declared that they were idols. Anti-aircraft guns had little effect, so the engineers placed anti-tank mines between their feet, then bored holes into their heads and packed them with dynamite.

Shiva as Lord of Dance (Nataraja) Shiva as Lord of Dance (Nataraja). Hindu; India (Tamil Nadu), Chola Dynasty. c. 11th century C.E. Cast bronze.

This religious object depicts Shiva, one of the most important Hindu divinities. Shiva is here depicted as the Lord of the Dance (nataraja), an iconic image in Indian art. Large scale bronzes images like this sculpture were (and still are) generally intended for temples. Devotees would visit a temple to be in a space sacred to the deity. The god is understood to inhabit the sculpture and therefore worshipers treat the sculpture as they would a god.

Signifying the universe’s cycle of death and rebirth, it is also a dance for each individual, representing the liberation of the believer through Shiva’s compassion. Shiva, often depicted in a flaming nimbus or halo, has flying locks of hair terminating in rearing cobra heads. It combines in single image Shiva’s roles as creator, preserver, and destroyer of the universe and conveys the Indian conception of the never-ending cycle of time. Shiva’s right arm gestures the “have no fear” mudra while the raised foot signifies promise of liberation. The god holds in his upper right hand the damaru (hand drum that made the first sounds of creation). His upper left hand holds agni (the fire that will destroy the universe which symbolizes destruction of the physical universe and our ego-centered perceptions). With his lower right hand, he makes abhayamudra (the gesture that allays fear). The dwarflike figure being trampled by his right foot represents apasmara purusha (illusion, which leads mankind astray). Shiva's front left hand, pointing to his raised left foot, signifies refuge for the troubled soul. The energy of his dance makes his hair fly to the sides.