Indian Sculpture and Painting, Illustrated by Typical Masterpieces, with an Explanation of their Motives and Ideals c10.48

c10.48

The method of treating the hair in formal curls which is characteristic of the Indian ideal of Buddha has given rise to much archæological speculation and condemnation. The general archæological conclusion, founded on the assumption of Indian artistic incapacity and bad taste, has been that Indian sculptors found the Grecian treatment, which is generally adopted in the Gandharan sculptures, too difficult to imitate, and that in consequence they fell back upon this, which Mr. Vincent Smith calls “the feeble conventionalism of ordinary Indian art.”¹