Indian Sculpture c5.s3.t1.62

c5.s3.t1.62

The achievement of the fifth and sixth centuries lies in the perfection of visualizing transubstantiated form on the basis of a knowledge that during the past centuries had derived its strength and increased its technical facilities by its inherent kinship with, and interpretation of, nature. Within the high level that prevails throughout India, Āryāvarta under the Guptas gives the subtlest expression of yoga and of stages towards the goal attainable through it in plastic terms; whereas the Dekkhan, with its weightier sculptures, conjures into form potentialities and powers that carry with them the knowledge how to withdraw into their origins. Gupta sculpture is an efflorescence in serenity, but in the sculpture of the Dekkhan deeper and darker forces stir. What follows in the seventh century in Āryāvarta are but the remnants of the feast, and these are touched by irradiations from the Dekkhan; whereas the seventh and the eighth centuries in the Dekkhan fulfil the trend of the sixth century.