Indian Sculpture and Painting, Illustrated by Typical Masterpieces, with an Explanation of their Motives and Ideals c7.21

c7.21

It is *primâ facie* incredible that a highly developed civilisation, spreading over thousands of years and over a vast area like India, which has produced a splendid literature and expressed lofty ideals in building materials, should have lacked the capacity, or found no occasion for giving them expression in materials for painting or sculpture. Nevertheless, this remains the popular opinion of Europe with regard to Indian art, and it is the hypothesis which has governed our whole educational policy in India, since universities, museums, art galleries, and schools of art were established under British rule. To suggest that an Indian art student will find in Indian art all the higher inspiration which he has been taught to seek only in the great schools of Europe is a novel proposition, opposed to all the accepted theories of orientalists.