A History of Fine Art in India and Ceylon, from the Earliest Times to the Present Day c13.s6.55

c13.s6.55

The greater part of the foregoing commentaries has nothing to do with the merits of the compositions as works of art. Any competent coppersmith can make to order rings symbolizing fire and other formal attributes in accordance with written rules, and such accessories, whether well or ill made, will be equally significant to the devout Hindu versed in the legends and metaphysics of his faith. The general lines of the principal image, too, are determined by pattern sketches, of which Dr. Coomaraswamy has published a specimen. Consequently, a perfectly correct group with all the needful apparatus for edification can be made passably well by any skilled bronze founder, whose work need not be anything higher than mere manufacture. The scope for the display of aesthetic feeling and creative skill, which distinguish an artist from a skilful mechanic, is restricted almost exclusively to the manner of rendering the action of dancing with passion, including, of course, the modelling of the principal figure. When various examples of the treatment of the prescribed theme are examined and compared they will be found to differ widely according to the degree of artistic power possessed by the maker of each. Among good examples may be classed Dr. Coomaraswamy's favourite in the Madras Museum, the Tanjore specimen (*ante*, 238), and No. 1 from Polonnāruwa (Plate LI). The No. 15 Polonnāruwa image (Fig. 188), without the ring of fire, is the most artistic of all. It is described as being 'the best finished of all the bronzes', and is deserving of the care spent on its production. If it could be freed from the horrible deformity of the extra arms, it might receive almost unqualified praise, but the monstrosity of the second left arm drawn across the breast, and calling for the surgeon's amputating knife to remove the diseased growth, spoils an otherwise elegant and admirable work.