The Antiquities of Orissa v1.c9.102

Language: English

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**Its general character :** The art of the Uriyās had its foundation on the canons of the *Śilpa Śāstra* which itself deduced them when Indian art had attained a certain pitch of excellence, for it conforms to them in all its main features ; and thus taking a text-book instead of nature for its model, it had an uphill work to exceed the limit of excellence which that text assigned it. The *Śilpa Śāstra*, however, dwelt on the forms, proportions, and features of gods, but it said nothing about ordinary human figures, and the artists had accordingly some liberty in dealing with the latter ; but as gods are only the ideal types of men, the advantage was not considerable. Nevertheless conventional forms are more frequent in the representations of gods than in those of mortals ; and the statues of gods and goddesses in [ 57 ] Orissa, though carved in finer stones and finished with greater care and labour, are less successful as works of art than figures of ordinary men. This is best shown in Illustrations Nos. 63 and 64. The first is taken from a colossal figure of Bhagavatī, “the mother of the universe”, elaborately carved in black chlorite, and placed in one of the principal niches of the Great Tower of Bhuvaneśvara ; and the second, a mere ornamental figure of a dancing girl, in a side niche of the Rājarāṇī Temple ; and yet the mortal is far handsomer and more faithful to nature than the goddess. Illustrations Nos.

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58, 59 and 60, also represent human figures, executed without much reliance on the rules of the *Śilpa Śāstra*, which may be taken to be average examples of the condition which the art of sculpturing such subjects had attained in Orissa. Generally speaking, the forms of Orissan human figures are light and natural, and their action easy and lively. There is also manifest in them a knowledge of anatomy, a study of the organic contexture of the body, of the contour of its different members, a sense of the laws of gravity and motion operating on the body under different circumstances, and an excellence of imitation, carried to such a degree of truth as to give convincing proofs of an advanced step, and a higher stage in the development of art than are to be met with in Egypt or Assyria. The outlines, instead of being hard, stiff, and rectilinear, as in Egyptian, Assyrian, Etruscan, and Daedalean sculptures, are everywhere rounded, soft, graceful, and in admirable repose. There is scarcely a single sharp angle, or a rigid straight line, in the whole composition to disturb its beauty; and the execution throughout, though deficient to a certain extent in chiselling and finish, is such as to give the palm of superiority to Orissa. Even in small bas-reliefs, the easy grace of the king or the queen, the respectful attitude of the attendants, the versatility of the story-teller, and the gravity of the musician, are represented with considerable success.

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The bas-reliefs of Udayagiri, though coarser and very much decayed, are even more full of life, action, and energy, and display a considerable amount of artistic conception. The bas-reliefs of Sāñcī and Amarāvatī are inferior to the last in this respect, but they are nevertheless superior to those of Egypt and Assyria. In some examples the poetical hyperboles of exceedingly slender waist and large hips are attempted to be represented in stone at a sad sacrifice of truth; but they are by no means the most finished samples of Uriyā art. The breasts are generally more protuberant than in Europe, Egypt, and Assyria, and are to some extent offensive to European taste; but this is probably due to a faithful representation of Orissan life, and not to a defect of art, or to a vitiated taste of the people reflected on the artists. The female breasts are generally much more developed in India than in higher latitudes; and in Orissa and Bengal they are particularly so, leading to early pendulosity to an extent unknown even in the North-Western Provinces. In the Panjab their size is generally not so large, nor does the declination commence until after the fortieth year, whereas in Bengal and Orissa it commences almost at the close of the teens, and the artist here, who would follow life, could not but produce something less beautiful than his brethren in Europe.

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This doubtless amounts to an admission that artists failed to develop the ideal—to combine in one figure the finest points of beauty from a hundred living models—such as the Greeks did, and the Indian poet conceived in his Tilottamā; but the fact cannot be gainsaid.