Early - Buddhist - Mathura Art

Buddhist art (c.150 BCE c.500 CE)

The major survivals of Buddhist art begin in the period after the Mauryans, from which good quantities of sculpture survives. Some key sites are Sanchi, Bharhut and Amaravati, some of which remain in situ, with others in museums in India or around the world. Stupas were surrounded by ceremonial fences with four profusely carved toranas or ornamental gateways facing the cardinal directions. These are in stone, though clearly adopting forms developed in wood. They and the walls of the stupa itself can be heavily decorated with reliefs, mostly illustrating the lives of the Buddha. Gradually life-size figures were sculpted, initially in deep relief, but then free-standing. Mathura was the most important centre in this development, which applied to Hindu and Jain art as well as Buddhist. The facades and interiors of rock-cut chaitya prayer halls and monastic viharas have survived better than similar free-standing structures elsewhere, which were for long mostly in wood. The caves at Ajanta, Karle, Bhaja and elsewhere contain early sculpture, often outnumbered by later works such as iconic figures of the Buddha and bodhisattvas, which are not found before 100 CE at the least.

Buddhism developed an increasing emphasis on statues of the Buddha, which was greatly influenced by Hindu and Jain religious figurative art, The figures of this period which were also influenced by the Greco-Buddhist art of the centuries after the conquests of Alexander the Great. This fusion developed in the far north-west of India, especially Gandhara in modern Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Indian Kushan Empire spread from Central Asia to include northern India in the early centuries CE, and briefly commissioned large statues that were portraits of the royal dynasty.

Art museums of India

Major cities

• National Museum, New Delhi
• Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS), Mumbai (formerly Prince of Wales Museum of Western India)
• Indian Museum, Kolkata
• Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad
• Government Museum (Bangalore)
• Government Museum, Chennai
• Government Museum and Art Gallery, Chandigarh

Archaeological museums

• AP State Archaeology Museum, Hyderabad
• Archaeological Museum, Thrissur
• City Museum, Hyderabad
• Government Museum, Mathura
• Government Museum, Tiruchirappalli
• Hill Palace, Tripunithura, Ernakulam
• Odisha State Museum, Bhubaneswar
• Patna Museum
• Pazhassi Raja Archaeological Museum, Kozhikode
• Sanghol Museum
• Sarnath Museum
• State Archaeological Gallery, Kolkata
• Victoria Jubilee Museum, Vijayawada

Modern art museums

• National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi - established 1954.
• National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai - established 1996.
• National Gallery of Modern Art, Bangalore - inaugurated 2009.
• Kolkata Museum of Modern Art - foundation laid in 2013.

Other museums

• Albert Hall Museum, Jaipur
• Allahabad Museum
• Asutosh Museum of Indian Art, Kolkata
• Baroda Museum & Picture Gallery
• Goa State Museum, Panaji
• Napier Museum, Thiruvananthapuram
• National Handicrafts and Handlooms Museum, New Delhi
• Sanskriti Museums, Delhi
• Watson Museum, Rajkot
• Srimanthi Bai Memorial Government Museum, Mangalore

See also

Notes

References

• Harle, J.C., The Art and Architecture of the Indian Subcontinent, 2nd edn. 1994, Yale University Press Pelican History of Art, ISBN0300062176
• Harsha V. Dehejia, The Advaita of Art (Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 2000, ISBN81-208-1389-8), p.97
• Kapila Vatsyayan, Classical Indian Dance in Literature and the Arts (New Delhi: Sangeet Natak Akademi, 1977), p.8
• Mitter, Partha. Indian Art (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001, ISBN0-19-284221-8)

Further reading

• Gupta, S. P., & Asthana, S. P. (2007). Elements of Indian art: Including temple architecture, iconography & iconometry. New Delhi: Indraprastha Museum of Art and Archaeology.
• Gupta, S. P., & Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute. (2011). The roots of Indian art: A detailed study of the formative period of Indian art and architecture, third and second centuries B.C., Mauryan and late Mauryan. Delhi: B.R. Publishing Corporation.
• Abanindranath Tagore (1914). Some Notes on Indian Artistic Anatomy. Indian Society of Oriental Art, Calcutta. OL6213535M.
• Kossak, Steven (1997). Indian court painting, 16th-19th century.. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN978-0870997839. (see index: pages148-152)
• Lerner, Martin (1984). The flame and the lotus: Indian and Southeast Asian art from the Kronos collections. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN978-0870993749. fully online
• Smith, Vincent A. (1930). A History Of Fine Art In India And Ceylon. The Clarendon Press, Oxford.
• Welch, Stuart Cary (1985). India: art and culture, 1300-1900. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art. ISBN9780944142134. fully online