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Chola Sacred Bronzes
BA (Hons.) History
University of Delhi
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this exhibition and catalogue – was clear- sighted and carefully constructed. The juxtaposition of studies and fin- ished products was one strength of the exhibition, and is replicated in the catalo- gue. What the latter – understandably – cannot show is the difference in size between the paintings. This difference is important, because the exhibition success- fully demonstrated how certain pairs or series of pictures clearly belong together. It also revealed repeatedly that the careful detail of a Friedrich painting can be as pronounced in a small work as in a large one. In his recentFriedrich(London: Phai- don, 2004), William Vaughan relates this question of size to pragmatic matters of Friedrich’s changing client base: large pictures for richer purchasers with bigger houses. There is no reason to question this explanation, but it is worth noting the effect when the works are displayed side-by-side: the miniatures and the grander canvases benefit from each other’s presence. To complement these arrangements were two other features: the reconstruction of the luminous effects of Friedrich’s transparent pictures, accompanied by spe- cially commissioned music by Georg Hajdu and Jacob Sello; and the responses to Friedrich’s work by three twenty-first-cen- tury visual artists, Kimsooja, Darren Al- mond and Olga Chernysheva. Their inclusion highlights the fact that Friedrich’s vision, startling to Heinrich von Kleist in 1810, has definitively recovered from inter- vening neglect and distortion, and now once again appears modern and compelling. Friedrich has figured strongly in the works of Joseph Beuys (not least in his relentless pairings), Gerhard Richter (on show with Friedrich at the Getty), Mariele Neudecker (whose installations have constructed Frie- drich spaces in three dimensions) and others. Back in 1972, Keith Roberts re- viewed the Tate show forThe Burlington Magazine. He was probably not wrong when he wrote, ‘Friedrich is not an easy artist; and anyone coming to him with Constable and Turner in mind [.. .] is in for a shock’ (vol. CXIV, p. 726). Today, international publics are unlikely to be shocked by Friedrich, but they will still be astounded. And if anyone thinks that Friedrich was just morose and humourless, here he is in his own words:
Once I lived for a whole week between rocks and fir trees at Uttewalde bottom [in ‘Saxon Switzerland’], and the whole time I met not a single living human being. It is true I do not
recommend this method to anyone; even for me it was too much. jonathan osmond Cardiff University
CHOLA: SACRED BRONZES OF
SOUTHERN INDIA
vidya dehejia, john guy, john eskenazi and daud ali Royal Academy of Arts 2006d35 $65. 158 pp. Fully illustrated isbn 9781903973844 UK dist. Thames and Hudson US dist. Harry N Abrams
I
t has been six decades since the Royal Academy (RA) in London, following India’s independence, last had on show
Indian bronzes. After such a long gap, it is no surprise that the exhibition shown from 11 November 2006 to 25 February 2007 in the Sackler Wing of the Acad- emy was much talked about and reviewed in all the major British papers, and saw a steady influx of visitors. A programme of lectures at the RA by scholars and specialists in the field, a series of films, and a focus day held in conjunction with the Nehru Centre in London
- the cultural wing of the High Commission of India in the UK – with the partici- pation of UK and Indian scholars of South Indian art, testifies to the commit- ment of the organisers to make the British public aware of the richness of the artistic legacy of the Chola dynasty. The Cholas ruled over Tamilnadu and much of Southern India for several centuries, from about 850 to 1250 CE. The workshops of which the Chola kings and queens were patrons pro- duced processional bronze images of (primarily, but not exclusively) Hindu gods and goddesses, known as utsava murtis. The images are characterised by slender- ness of the figure, precision of posture, often dance-related, and a certain sharp- ness of features. Queen Sembiyan Maha- devi, who ruled in the tenth century, seems to have been an active and outstanding patron, donating land and gold to existing temples, and fostering one of the finest schools of bronze casting in the Tamil region. She was also responsible for a number of innovations: it was apparently in her time that a bronze image of Devi, the consort of the god Shiva, began to be installed in temples, near the sanctum. The icon of Shiva as Lord of the Dance (Nataraja), showing the god surrounded by a circle of fire, with his left leg lifted across his body, while he stands on his right leg, bent at the knee, trampling Apasmara, the demon of ignorance, is one of the most spectacular images coming
Krishna dancing on Kaliya,Cholaperiod,late10th/ early11thcentury Society,NewYork:Mrand MrsJohnDRockefellerIIICollection:Lynton Gardiner Sacred Bronzes of Southern IndiabyVidyaDehejiaet al.
24 TheArtBook volume 14 issue 3 august 2007 r2007 the authors. journal compilationr2007 bpl/aah
Exhibitions,MuseumsandGalleries
out of the Chola ateliers. Though already made in stone by the previous dynasty, the Pallavas, the icon was refined in Chola times, when some of the finest examples, still extant, were made. The catalogue that accompanied the exhibition is informative, with gorgeous colour photographs – the bronzes are most photogenic and there are excellent photographs giving details of ornaments and dress and showing off the images in all their splendour. John Guy, Senior Curator of South and Southeast Asian Art at the V&A, London, wrote the opening essay, discussing the devotional images of southern India and providing a historical and religious context, with references to archaeological informa- tion, giving some background on the major shift that occurred in colonial times, when the bronzes began to be appraised by the British as collectors’ items, leading to
subsequent museum displays. The second essay is by Vidya Dehejia, holder of the Barbara Stoler Miller Chair in Indian Art at Columbia University, New York, regarded worldwide as an authority on the bronzes of the Chola period and author of books and articles about Queen Sembiyan Mahadevi in particular. Her essay is a scholarly discussion of the aesthetics of the bronzes, dwelling on their religious value and reconnecting the images with the devotional literature of their time, the hymns of the Tamil saints, from which she quotes extensively. Iconographic details are explained as also several myths related to the gods and goddesses, evoking a complex socio-cultural, religious and artistic context: ‘the physical beauty of the gods’ writes Dehejia ‘was seen as a path to experience the entirety of the god’s pre- eminence, thereby attaining personal fulfil- ment and realisation’. There follows an erudite piece replete with references to ancient Hindu scrip- tures and Hindu philosophers by John Eskenazi, a leading art dealer and con- noisseur of Indian art,which demonstrates Eskenazi’s profound admiration for the bronzes and the culture they stem from.
The catalogue entries by Vidya Dehejia are as detailed and impeccably scholarly as can be expected. An appendix by Daud Ali, Senior Lecturer in Early Indian History at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, discusses and presents an excerpt from the Vikramacholanaula, ‘Theulaof the king Vikrama Chola’, the ulabeing a poetic genre that became established in Chola times, connected with the processional bronzes. A second appendix gives the sculptor Auguste Rodin’s enraptured comments, written in 1913, about the Nataraja icon, which he discovered through photographs of a bronze from Tiruvalangadu, allegedly shown to him by his friend, the archae- ologist Victor Goloubew. The exhibition as such was disappoint- ing: the beauty and appeal of the bronzes is beyond dispute, but their display left a lot to be desired, crammed as they were in glass cabinets and generally, with labels that were rather concise and terse. There could have been a better and more imaginative use of space, with images of the temple cities projected onto walls, to give visitors a better sense of the context of
Somaskanda: the family of Shiva seated together on Mount Kailasha,Cholaperiod,secondhalf of theeleventhcentury Cornell: courtesyJohnEskenazi Sacred Bronzes of Southern IndiabyVidyaDehejiaet al.
r2007 the authors. journal compilationr2007 bpl/aah volume 14 issue 3 august 2007 TheArtBook 25
Exhibitions,MuseumsandGalleries
Chola Sacred Bronzes
Course: BA (Hons.) History
University: University of Delhi
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