Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c5.11

c5.11

MEANING—The formal study of art as outlined above reaches its fulfilment in the discovery of the meaning of which an art object stands as concrete symbol. According to the Indian theory of æsthetics, art as well as poetry is comprised of four elements, namely, (i) Rasa, (ii) Artha, (iii) Chhandas and (iv) Śabda. Rasa is the soul of all art, a spiritual quality enshrining its permanent value. It is the basic, essential and inscrutable Divine element in creation as well as art. Rasa is the aggregate of human emotions (Bhāva). Both art and poetry aim to express the emotional contents of the human mind. The theorists speak of eight or nine Rasas with their respective sentiments or emotions. All high art evokes an emotion in the heart of the connoisseur. The poet and the artist begin by conceiving an emotion to be expressed through word or a material medium (Rūpa).