Vastu-shastra (Vol. I: Hindu Science of Architecture; Vol. II: Hindu Canons of Iconography and Painting) v2.c77.254

v2.c77.254

etc., etc. ‘Adepts in drawing designs of creepers and flowers they run their fingers bathed in colour dexterously over whitened pots and plates...., etc.’—can convince us that patra-painting and its handmaid, the kaṇṭaka-delineations were in a very advanced state betokening a high stride that this side branch of pictorial art had taken in ancient India, So much about the canonical presentation of the styles of painting, a few words may also be added, of historical heritage of Indian painting. We know that in India three distinct styles or schools of Painting arose and reached the culmination of their artistic craftsmanship—the Buddhist, the Hindu (the early and the medieval, the latter being the Rājapūta) and the Mohammedan or Mughal. In this connection it may be said that early Hindu painting is devoid of any historical information in our possession to classify it into different schools or styles. Similarly the classical frescoes of Buddhist painting too can-not be said to have any different and distinct schools or styles of their own. "But the historian, Taranath, throws some useful, although confusing, light on the Buddhist art of painting in India which may be considered at this stage. He refers to three styles of early Buddhist art, which may be described as the Deva, the Yaksha and the Naga styles. The Deva style was practised in the country of Magadha (an area corresponding approximately to modern Bihar) for some centuries after the advent of Buddha—from the sixth century B.C. to the third century B.C. He relates that in the former days human masters, who were endowed with miraculous power, produced astonishing works of art. It is expressly stated in the Vinaya-agama and other works that the wall paintings, etc., of these masters were such as to deceive by their likeness to the actual things depicted".