Jain Miniature Paintings from Western India c8.6

c8.6

The technique in medieval Indian painting may be studied from the few remnants of wall-paintings, book illustrations, cloth paintings, and painted wooden book-covers, on the one hand, and from the Sanskrit documents on medieval painting, on the other. As observed by Dr. Thompson, "Technique in the kinetic sense must be studied from the actual works of those who practised it. The static elements of technique, the materials in which technique are exercised, can be described, and often were described by the medieval authors; and there is some interest perhaps some value derived from the knowledge of these materials which the eyes alone cannot give. Technique means the synthesis of many sorts of element, physical and otherwise, and the raw materials of painting are no more than dross; but they are necessary dross, and not without influence upon the other factors in the art. It needs our best observation, and as many sorts of knowledge as we can bring to it to appreciate 'the flowering of genius, the intellect's control, and the power of reason, in the smallest work as well as in the great things' of medieval painting".