Ajanta: The Colour and Monochrome Reproductions of the Ajanta Frescoes Based on Photography v1.c4.19

v1.c4.19

It is a vision of the living world that the artists of Ajanta present; the teeming earth, the springing plants, the birds, the deer, the elephants; crimson-pillared pavilions and porticoes; gateways and roofs of cities; and among all these the life of men and women and children, supple-limbed, gracious in gesture, freely moving, playful or pensive in mood; all earthly life in its laughter and its grief: but always emerging from it a life of the spirit prevails, the spirit that contemplates and is filled with compassion. Sometimes, as in the fresco reproduced on Plate VIb, this spiritual presence appears in the doorway of the house embodied in the Bhikshu, who comes like a messenger, and is welcomed by its inmates. But it is in the marvellous fresco reproduced on Plate XXIV that this vision of life attains its consummation.