A Study of Lajja Gauri Images from Gujarat

Granthaalayah Publications and Printers, 2024

Art is the expression of thoughts and feelings, which inspires by the events around oneself, it takes support of various mediums to express ones feelings and emotions. The matriarchal nature of the society in ancient times gives stability to our thinking. The reason must have been that men would have been responsible for collecting the resources for living in the society and in their absence it would have been the responsibility of women to run the social system. Almost this tradition is more or less maintained till today. Such traditions and conditions of contemporary society are depicted through various mediums of art. In these mediums, it is necessary to collect some important information regarding the marking of men and women, some are marked according to the plot described in mythology and some are independent. The detail study is discussed below with reference.

Izvestia of the Ural federal university. Series 2. Humanities and Arts

This paper aims to outline and explore the development of iconographic forms and metaphysical grounding of one of the most venerable and distinguished Buddhist female deities, Prajсāpāramitā. The Buddhist female pantheon gained a paramount pre-eminence with the idolization of Prajñāpāramitā, establishing the significance of female figure and, especially, mother symbolism during the early medieval period under the liberal patronage of the Pala dynasty of Eastern India. The religious imageries and practices of this deity gradually disseminated to the adjoining Himalayan kingdoms of Nepal and Tibet through pedagogic and religious linkages, and became an integral part of their society. To understand the factors of cross-cultural assimilation through the study of representational forms and its metaphysical grounding, the paper explores and shows the metaphorical meaning of ‘prajсā’ propounded in the Prajñāpāramitā discourse, and its representation in cultic icons of the goddess Prajñāpār...

Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research), 2014

Religious imagery helps us to understand not only the contemporary religious setting but also provides a wide perspective to understand the nature of religious texts, iconographic norms and their associations. These sculptures have a pivotal role to reconstruct the sectarian history. Sculptures also facilitate understanding of regional influences, cultural interactions, and the association between textual and iconographic traits. The present article describes a recently noticed image of Lakul¢∂a from Bhadravati in Chandrapur district of Maharashtra. Lakul¢∂a is considered the founder of the P°∂upata sect of ÷aivism. He was later on considered as one of the incarnations of ÷iva. A few images of Lakul¢∂a have been reported from Maharashtra including images from cave-temples, structural temples and solitary images. The antiquity of Lakul¢∂a images in Maharashtra goes back to the fourth-fifth century C. E. The earliest image is found at Mandhal (Deo 1988: 287;Chaubey 1997:127). However, recent studies on the V°k°taka sculptures have questioned this identification (Jamkhedkar 1991a, 1991b; Bakker 1997). A four-handed image found at Mandhal has been identified as ga∞a (Jamkhedkar 1991b:87) or ga∞°dhyak∑a (Bakker 1997:99-100). This iconographic identification needs to be reexamined. It Recently Noticed Lakul ¢∂ a image From Bhadravati, Maharashtra ....

Granthaalayah Publications and Printers, 2023

Throughout its history Kashmir has experienced an art life very much its own as well as accepting and absorbing influences and imported from neighbouring areas. The sculptural masterpieces that have survived in the valley have attracted the attention of art-historians and the scholars in the allied disciplines from time to time and have always been praised for their fine workmanship and iconographic features. Sculptors have not created the images only for the religious purpose but in the images are added subtle human moods and sentiments and have captured various states of emotions and feelings. Artists have captured the rhythm of life of all living beings in general and represented women in particular on the surfaces of the temples and in images. The aesthetic aspect of the sculptural motifs of the temple and images depends upon the religious canons of measurement in art. The carving approach of Kashmir's ancient and early medieval temples Goetz (1951) and Goetz (1969) includes a significant number of female images. Women from various cultures are portrayed in sculptures. Women can be seen here in a variety of subjects. The sculptures show representations of many feminine beauty ideals. This essay aims to shed light on the representation of women in Kashmir's early sculpting and iconographic traditions.

The Gupta age is said to be the Golden period of India. During this time India entered upon the classical phase of sculpture, art and literature. Here the techniques of art attained highest precision, definite types were evolved and ideals of beauty were formulated with perfection. Idealization was a constituent element of the Gupta art. One of the most significant innovation during this period is the wealth of sculptures of the human figure. By now all animal and vegetal patterns had been eliminated from the narrative and artists simply underlined the importance of the human form. The artists created sculptures as personified form of deities (god & goddess). It is during this period that the characteristic elements of the Indian temple emerged and the plastic forms started to emerge as an integral part of the general architectural scheme. The stone carving from the temples at Deogarh and those from the caves at Udayagiri are excellent specimens of figure sculpture in their decorative setting. Although the sources indicate that many temples were constructed mostly dedicated to lord Shiva and Lord Vishnu but unfortunately not much has survived of Gupta temple architecture. What intrigues me here is the prominent focus on sculptures of various female goddesses present in these temples. As compared to the earlier prehistoric times the female figures became more and more attractive and demanded attention. With growing time the sculptures of women goddess grew both in size and grandeur leaving a perfect example of their perception for the future generations to follow.

An elaborate description of figure-imagination of God and Goddesses, sculptural features, iconometry (standard measurement) are found in the Puranas, Samhitas, Tantras, Agamas and Silpasastras. The term 'iconology' includes the study of figure-imagination, sculptural features like pedestal, postures (hand postures, foot posture and body language), vehicle, weapon and headgear of God and Goddess and canons of sculptural art. On the basis of iconographic characteristic and canons of sculptural art the ancient artist used to create the statue of God and Goddess. So, without profound knowledge of Iconography it is difficult to specify the identity of ancient temple sculpture. In this research paper we are trying to specify the Iconographic identity of Goddess Durga found in the Brahmaputra Valley of Assam on the basis of canonical theory as described in ancient masterpieces such

Lajja Gauri, the shameless woman … the " nameless woman" .

Saints and Ascetics • Chapter 10 Satis and Heroes Chapter 11 Jaina Images Chapter 12 Non-Religious Themes Chapter 13 Animals, Birds and Mythical Beasts 100 Chapter 14 Decorative Motifs Appendices Glossary Bibliography Iconographic Index H. Bird Slab depicting self-immolation. Kamalapuram Museum.

Speaking Archaeologically vol IV , 2021

In Indian art, women are often depicted as maidens with graceful postures (Varadpande, 2006). They are also depicted as the symbol of fertility through their depiction as Mother Goddesses. According to texts like the Shilpa Shastra and Kshirarnava, Surasundaris could be depicted as engaging in a variety of different activities, ranging from tending to a child to playing a musical instrument, and even wielding weapons of war. The aim of this paper is to examine the iconographic features of one such surasundari, Manjughosha. These surasundaris are shown with bows and arrows, knives, and other such features, which might allude to the fact that women of that period knew the art of defence (Sompura, 1975). The paper tries to understand how the existing tradition of women in combat might have led to the development of the Manjughosha figurines. For the purposes of this paper, a total of 11 samples were studied. Some of these are housed in museums across the world, while others are situated in temple sites across India. A database was created on the basis of these objects that have been added in the appendices at the end of this paper (See Appendix I and 2). Conclusions are drawn based on object analysis, combined with a comprehensive survey of the primary and secondary sources. However, due to the limited availability of these sculptures, it is possible that many parallels were not recorded or accessible for the purpose of this research.