Maurya and Shunga Art c15: XII. Character of Śuṅga Art
Maurya and Śuṅga Art c15
- Language
- English
XII. Character of Śuṅga Art
c15.2
Enough has been said to show that the art of the time of the Śuṅgas is not an isolated phase in the history of Indian art, that it had at its back a large repository of ancient practice which came to be fixed in stone under the patronage of the Buddhist saṃgha, the royalty and the nobility, and the wealthy and prosperous landed and commercial classes of the time of the Śuṅgas. I have also tried to show that it represents the continuity of a tradition which reflects the ethnic fusion that had been going on for centuries, and which had been born of the seed sown on the Indian soil, more particularly in the Madhyadeśa and parts of Eastern India. Further, I have sought to demonstrate that from the very first stage of Barhut to the last of Bodhgaya there is a progressive evolution of the tradition referred to above. It was during this time that the basis of some of the essential qualities of what we call Indian plastic art was laid down. These essential qualities would persist through the ages, throughout the modulations brought about by the passage of time and by the ethnic conditions of the country.
c15.3
Unlike Maurya court art, the art of the time of the Śuṅgas is born of India’s own seed with deep and intimate ethnic and local roots. It aims at collective expression of the ideas and ideologies of the people of Madhyadeśa and Eastern India and reflects their tastes and preferences. Maurya naturalism views the visible world in a state of momentary nervous tension and renders it in stagnant compactness and strength; it relies essentially on the outer aspect of things. Śuṅga naturalism on the other hand does not ignore the outer aspect of things but links it in an inherent connectedness with a pre-existent situation. This view of the visible world gives to Śuṅga Art its lively and fluid character, a quality that is ever present in Indian plastic art. A simple awareness of life enlivens and illumines the art of the Śuṅgas; a consciousness of earthly power, dignity and grandeur impart to the art of the Mauryas its monumental strength and heavy compactness.
c15.4
Śuṅga art is richer in social content and in the social components of its appeal and patronage. Its direction is more collective than individual, and its motive more narrative and representational than suggestive and symbolical. While Maurya art is conscious, courtly and sophisticated Śuṅga art is naive, popular and perhaps also primitive in a way. These essential differences, it may now be safely argued, reflect two different culture-ideologies; one reared up by the Mauryas and limited within the court and expressive of a mind highly urban, sophisticated and international in outlook, while the other no doubt ethnically conditioned reflect a national outlook and popular character. Maurya art reflects the exhaustion of a tradition born outside of its own people; Śuṅga art reflects the lively unfoldment of a tradition born of the blood and flesh of the people to whom it belongs.