Indian Sculpture and Painting, Illustrated by Typical Masterpieces, with an Explanation of their Motives and Ideals c7.146

c7.146

In many ways it is analogous to the hybrid, Anglicised sculpture of modern India, and before we continue it will be instructive to compare the traditional, idealised Yogi type with an attempt by a modern Indian sculptor to represent a modern Indian Yogi. The portrait statuette of Swami Bhaskarânanda Saraswati (Plate I. (*b*)), the Benares Yogi whose photograph is reproduced in the same plate, is very popular with educated Indians. It is typical of modern Indian art influenced by European ideas, and of what passes for European culture among the great majority of Indians. Here there is a deliberate attempt to reproduce the whole anatomical system, but the spirituality, greatness of style, and instinct for beauty of the old ideal art have given place to a feeble imitation of detail and an affectation as shallow and insincere as that which is so conspicuous in the art of Gandhara.