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Digitized by the Internet Archivein 2010 with funding from

University of Toronto

http://www.archive.org/details/rupannind09indi

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RUPAMA JOURNAL OF ORIENTALART

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x>z&X3SS xcxs'^rxxs'^Mirs uaLrx> ox>xzirxoxiirs.H E. LORD ROXALDSHAV. GOVERXOR OF BEXGAL. iK;n,cs.

I feel sure ' RUPAM ' WILL BE WELCOMED IN CULTURED CiRCLEt^, and I hope it may become widelyUnown. All who read the first issue will look forward eagerly to succeeding issueswith renewed congratulationon SO EXCELLENT A PRODUCTION--DR. RABINDRA NATH TAGORE writes:'RUPAM' is an EXCELLENT PRODUCTION. Have been delighted to receive it."SIR JOHN MARSHALL. DIRECTOR-GENERAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY IN INDIA, writes:'Glancing through its pages it strikes me as A MOST \ALUABLE PRODUCTION, which all of us, who areinterested in Indian Art, will greatly appreciate."E. B. HAVELL, Esq., writes:

" Congratulate you and your co-workers upon the great success of ihe lirst number of ' RUPAM.'deserve the greatest credit for the EXCELLENT WAY IT IS TURNED OUT, for the VERYMATERL\LS you have collected, and for the \ERY WELL WRITTEN ARTICLES contained^l:ue of a widi appreciation in Europe as well as in India.''A FRENCH ARTIST FROM PARIS writes:

.A.II0W me to congratulate on RUPAM.' May the BEAUTIFUL FORMS (RUPAM') of INDIANdelight the eve of many a Frenchman ! "THE TIMES (.London):" The Tournal is edited by a distinguished Critic of Indian .\rt. and it promises to be OF MUCH INTERESTAND VALUE TO STUDENTS. It is a large and HANDSOMELY PRODUCED WORK, with many EXCELLENTILLUSTR.A.TIONS, and it SHOULD FIND A LARGE CIRCLE OF READERS, both in India and in the West."THE ATHENJEUM (Loitdon):"'RUPAM' promises wellis of REAL VALUE for STUDENTS and is SCHOLARLY and INSTRUCTIVE."ARTS GAZETTE (London):"The New Quarterlv. admirably reproduced, should APPEAL STRONGLY to All Interested in INDIAN ART."BRITAIN AND INDIA (London):" It is a NOTEWORTHY PRODUCTION. .\ useful and brilliant career is before it.of India should SUBSCRIBE TO THIS TOURNAL."THE ASIATIC REVIEW (London):"Lovers of Indian Art will welcome the appearance of 'RUPAM.' The plates are

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You and theyVALUABLERUPAM' isART

welcome surprise. The letterpress of highof AN EXCELLENTorder of excellence as

will receive the support deserves from

letterpress and excellent

QUALITY and will come asthe plates."THE BURLINGTON MAGAZINE {London):" This handsomely illustrated Publication printed on hno Indian paper makes an impressive debut with severalscholarly articles on aspects of Indian Art. We hope that ' RUPAM - learned societies and students of Oriental Art."THE PIONEER (Allahabad):"An interesting and attractively produced Magazine The general get-up. bothillustrations, is of A STANDARD RARE IN INDIAN PERIODICALS.THE STATESMAN (Calcutta):"A noteworthy event in the revival of Indian Art is the appearance of the first number of 'RUPAM.' The newpublication is produced in the style of an edition dc lu.ve, arid no pains appear to have been spared to bring both theillustrations and the letterpress up to THE HIGHEST STANDARD OF EXCELLENCE. It has been the Editor'sobject to give onlv original contributions of real value,"THE ENGLISHMAN (Calcutta) :"The Magazine contains a great deal of INTERESTING READING MATTER."THE INDIAN DAILY NBIVS (Calcutta) :"A Journal like this SUPPLIES A DESIDER.A,TUM. The Editorial charge could not have been placed m morecapable hands."THE MADRAS MAIL (Madras) ." We heartily welcome the ' RUPAM ' AS MEETING A LONG-FELT WANT for inculcating in students, Indianand foreign, a just appreciation of the great achievement in the field of Indian Art. The first issue gives promise of auseful career amongst Indian periodicals, of which there are but few devoted to Art."THE TIMES OF INDIA (Bombay) :"The Quarterly should be of great interest to Archjeologists all over the world, for the articles, which are wellprinted on good paper, are written by Experts in their various subjects, and are PERFECT MINES OF ERUDITEINFORMATION."THE NEW INDIA (Madras):" The Magazine has proved A MOST ATTR.A,CTIVE PRODUCTION, both as regards substance and appearance.Printed on Indian paper and wrapped in an artistic cover of gold-coloured parchment also Indian madethe Magazineis one on which the eyes of real Lovers of India will dwell with pride and pleasure."THE THEOSOPHIST (Madras): RUPAM is the appropriate title of a new Quarterly Journal of Oriental Art, chiefly Indian. The first numberis in itself A VERIT.A,BLE WORK OF ART, both in respect of illustrations and get-up generally."THE INDIAN REVIEW (Madras):" We welcome this pioneer and praiseworthy attempt to publish a Quarterly specially devoted to Indian Art. Thefirst number is A SUPERB EDITION."THE ARYA (Pondkherry) : ....The appearance of this superb Quarterlv, admirable in irs artistic get-up, and magnificent illustrations, is asignificant indication of the progress that is being made in the revival of the esthetic mind of India, and every loverof Indian Art and Culture ought to possess ' RUPAM.' He will find it one of the LUXURIES THAT ARENECESSITIES."THE MODERN REVIEW (Calcutta): ,.^ . . ."'RUPAM' is a unique cultural enterprise and should be supported by all colleges, museums, libraries, and othercultural institutions, and by private individuals."BULLETIN OF THE INDIAN RATIONALISTIC SOCIETY (Calcutta): ,"We have no hesitation in declaring that it is one of the BEST OF ITS KIND we have come across. It is aGREAT JOURNAL and deserves our BEST CONGRATULATIONS."

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RUPAMAn IllustratedQuarterly Journal of Oriental Art

Chiefly Indian

Edited byORDHENDRA C. GANGOLY

FOR THE INDIAN SOCIETY OF ORIENTAL ART, NO. 12. SAMAVAYAMANSIONS, HOGG STREET, CALCUTTA

No. 9January 1922

EDITORIAL OFFICE; No. 7, OLD POST OFFICE STREETCALCUTTA, INDIA

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I Printed by THACKER, SPINK & CX)., CalcuttaAMD

Published by O. C GANGOLYat

tio. 7, Old Post Office Streeti Calcutta.

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CONTENTS.Page

I. The Art of Asit Kumar Haldar, by James H. Cousins (Madras) 1II. The Creative Ideal, by Rabindra Nath Tagore (Bolepur) ... ... 5

III. The Aesthetics of Young India, by Benoy Kumar Sarkar (Paris) ... 8IV. The Aesthetics of Young India : A Rejoinder, by Agastya (Canopus) ... 24V. ' The Grief of Uma,' By Nanda Lai Hose ... ... ... 27

VI. On Some Recent Illustrations of Meghadutam ... ... ... 29VII. Composition of Line in Nataraja Images, by W. S. Hadaway (Madras) ... 31

Reviews ... ... ... ... ... 35Notes ... ... ... ... .. ... ... 36

All Rights of Translation and Reproduction are strictly reserved.

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EDITOR'S NOTE.The Editor is not responsible for the views expressed by contributorsor correspondents. And the publication of a contribution or correspond-ence shall not necessarily imply the identification of the Editor with theviews and opinions expressed in such contribution or correspondence.The Editor will welcome proposals for articles, provided that they aretypewritten, or quite easily legible ; he can, however, use only articleswritten by those who have a real knowledge of the subjects treated, andhas no use for articles which are compiled from other works or which con-

tain no original matter.A stamped and addressed envelope must accompany all manuscripts,

of which the return is desired in case of non-acceptance. Every care willbe taken of manuscripts, but copies should be kept, as the Editor can inno case be responsible for accidental loss.

All photographs intended for publication should be printed on albu-minised silver paper, and preferably on shiny bromide paper.

SUBSCRIPTION RATES : Rupees sixteen annually. Post free,rupees seventeen, in India; Foreign, rupees eighteen. Single copy, rupeesfive, post free. Owing to the state of exchange it is not possible to quotethe rate of subscription in Foreign Currency. Remittance for subscrip-tion should, therefore, be sent in Indian Currency. Complete sets for 1928,Price Rs. 36. Very few sets available.

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I THE ART OF ASIT KUMAR HALDAR.By JAMES H. COUSINS.Acertain eminent art critic, annotating abook of reproductions of pictures byeastern artists, in which he had in-

cluded Mr. Asit Kumar Haildar's ' Apsara,'noted the obvious influence of Ajanta in thispicture. Now it happened that the pictureof the dancing Apsara was done byMr. Haldar some time before he went withMr. Nanda Lai Bose and others on LadyHerringham's epoch-making expedition(19191911) to the rock-temples of Ajantato make copies of the frescoes which hadsurvived time, climate and yandalism. Italso happens that, despite his beautifulreproductions in water colour of two of thecave frescoes, Mr. Haider left Ajantabehind him, and in the subjects of hischoice and his method of presenting them,has given it a wide berth. His two repro-ductions of the frescoes were purelyhumana girl with a fly-flapper, and thepurification of a prince. He has made hissalutation to divinity in three pictures of SriKrishna, a couple concerning Mahadeva, andone of the Lord Buddha. He has escapedtheology, almost escaped the puranas, andhas earned a distinctive place in the hier-arcTiy of Indian artists as a painter who,whether dealing with mythology and sym-bolism, with history or with humanity andnature, invests his work with a pervasivesense of the intermingling of the humanspirit with the divine spirit.And yet, while the art critic was quiteout in his hazard as to the Ajantan influencein Mr. Haldar's * Apsara,' he was right in avery real and deep sense, in the sense that noartist (and particularly no artist endowedwith the aesthetic and mental responsivenessof Mr. Haldar and his fellows in the modernBengal school) can escape the characteristiccurrent in the ocean of their racial conscious-ness. The influence of the Buddhist frescoe(if * influence ' it can be called) is more ex-plicit in his touching composition of ' Guhakand Rama 'where the hero embraces the* untouchable ' and demonstrates that onetouch of human nature makes the wholeworld akin (PI. I A). The more I see of

oriental art, and the more I brood on it witha view to apprehending (if I czui) its secret,the more clearly I realise that there is anangle of art-vision in the East which isfundamentally distinct from the angle ofart-vision of the West. By fundamentaldistinction I do not mean matters of techni-que, such as the Indian preference forwater-colour; or of mannerism, such as theslender waist, and snaky ftnger of Ajanta;or of physical vision, such as the posture andperspective that are a bewilderment to thenon-eastern eye which looks for what itregards as truth to nature. I mean an atti-tude of the spirit, a difference of directionwhich, while it may meet somewhere on thethither side of the sphere of reality, is, atour line of longitude, as distinct as thedirection of east and westas distinct, also,as the crystallising polar regions of art, andart's volatilising tropics. Deeper thansubject and method in art is the controllingcentral direction of a people's philosophy oflife. The emotional quality, the nientalsignificajice, the very turn of the wrist ofnon-Asian art, are coloured, furnished andguided by the concept of a single earth life,beginning at birth, and passing throughdeath to a state of eternal fixity in bliss ormisery. Even where art is agnostic, its ag-nosticism is a reaction to the general view oflife and life hereafter: its denial is shapedand tinctured by what it denies. Anti-Christ-ian art is Christian art in a posture ofnegation.

So is it also with regard to Asian art mits Indian phase (which includes the early artof China, Korea and Japan). Below itspatient, reposeful, sober, impersonal exterior;below its feeling, whose vibrations are oftenso subtle as to be imperceptible to those whorespond to slower auid more obvious wave-lengths; below its intellectual assumptions,which are not bound upon the forehead ofVT-inkled speculation, but twisted with theconvolutions of the brain and passed into theessential stuff of thought; there is the con-cept of a single lifenot a single personallife on the earth, but One Life elaborating

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itself through the wonderful multiplicityand variety of form in nature and humtmity,and smiling with a joy that is reflected in thesoul of the artist when he apprehends andregisters some juxtaposition of apparentlydiscrete elements in the detail of life and socomes upon the secret of her unity.

This concept shines through the art ofAjanta. It also illuminates the art of Bengalto-daynot because the BengaJ artists have,rightly, drawn from the true fountain-headof their art in some measure, but because theone concept nourishes and inspires both. Thegreat Buddhist art of over twelve centuriesago is one with modern Hindu art, even whereit has divested itself of theology and ritual,as is largely the case in the work of AsitKumar Haldar. The pressure towards thiscentral idea of the essential unity of life isinescapable, and shows itself in manyaspects. Buddhism was Hinduism shorn ofits heaven-ascending wings. Hindu artto-day is Buddhist art readmitted to thepresence of the heavenly hierarchy withappropriate ceremonieJ. It is so also in thegeneral life of India. Superficially it iskaleidoscopic; essentially it is telescopic,the concentric circle of the present andintermediate eras enfolding the smsdl glassof deep vision. With a turn of the headone can pass, on an Indian street, fromto-day to three thousand years agofromthe flash and stench of an automobile tothe trudging figure of one in the unbrokenline of chanters of the vedas, clad in beadsand loin cloth and the odour of sanctity.There is no clash in the mind that knows.The vision of the seers was vertical. It sawthe meshes of evolution through which theparticularisations of the future were sifted.The vahana of Rama crossed the skies be-tween India and Ceylon (if not in actual phy-sical fact, at least in real anticipation) cen-turies before the Greek Daedalus set wingson the shoulders of his son or Leonardo daVinci nearly killed his servant in trying to dothe same. In India the ancient is up-to-datein anticipation, and the up-to-date is theancient fulfilled. The discoveries of Jaga-dish Chandra Bose are but annotations tothe upanishads, elaborations from the rootprinciple of their life and his" thereis no truth apart from the unity ofthings."

.^ Hence it comes to pass that in making asurvey of the work of any one of the majorartists of the modern Bengal school, one hasa feeling that the whole school is squatteringaround the central figure of the moment, andthat one has to address it (as Queen Victoriacomplained that Gladstone addressed her) asa public meeting with Rajputana and theKangra Valley to left and right of the middleforeground, and the caves of Ajanta in thebackground.

But while there is this essential unifica-tion underlying the whole history and rangeof Indian painting, there is a characteristicdifi^erentiation between the works of thevarious artists. Mr. Haldar is among thecolour-poets of the Bengal school, not afterthe dramatic and epic manner of that masterof tenuous strength, Nauida Lai Bose, butafter the lyrical manner of his own sensitiveand rhythmical genius which has expresseditself in a gallery of beautiful paintings inwater-colour and of pencil drawings of won-derful fineness.

I have seen many of his original pictures.I have seen practically all of them in ade-quate reproductions. I have talked over artand its significances with him and his fellow-artists under the moon in the congenial at-mosphere of that home of poetry and paint-ing Shantiniketan, with the world's song-master, Rabindranath, not far away; andlooking back over a month of time and athousand miles of distance, I have with me,as I think of Mr. Haldar's art, a sense of deli-cate beauty, of exquisite reserve of highsignificance. His pair of lotus panels (Fig.A) are a pure offering to the spirit ofBeauty, conceived in the same mood ofworship as the lotus-offering figure in' Pronam.' I recall as examples of hisreserve his water-colour picture of a poormother and her child in a rainstorm [Photo-gravure Frontispiece]. Mother's love is inthe arm zoid hand that give compassionate,though inadequate, shelter to her baby fromthe thick slemt lines of a tropical shower.The patience and faith of India are in thequiet unanxious eyes that seem to see tothe end of the showereyes that are meta-phors of the permanence of vision that seescalm beyond the transient fury of the storm.The captive woman (* The Prize of War

')sits patiently in the tent awaiting destiny.

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The dancing old man and child in * TheCycle of Spring * move ceremonially, eventhough, with fine insight, the artist has madethe petals, the grass, the shrub, the hair andbeard of the old man, and the clouds all movein a cosmic dance in the same direction.

There is no abzuidon either of despair orjoy in these, or any other, of Mr. Haldar'spictures;for abandonmeans exaggeration inone or other direction anda denial of the other sideof the question. To attainintellectual virtuosity,Mr. Haldar and his fel-lows would have to shutthemselves out from thethrill of ananda (joy),that seems to flickerthrough every line of theirwork. To achieve emo-tional piognancy theywould have to put thesmoked glass of denialin their line of vision.Their work, as exempli-fied in that of Mr. Haldar,is at the point of poisebetween head and heart,escaping on one side thecaparisoned frigidity ofmuch of the intellectualart of Europe, and, on theother, the sulphurousemotional heat of thecinematograph grimace.A fine example of thispoise is found in Mr.Haldar's 'Rasalila' (videPlate II) which wasfirst seen at the Decem-ber 1920 exhibition ofthe Indian Society of theOriental Art in Calcuttaand which I had theopportunity of meditatingupon in October 1921 atShantiniketan. Ostensiblyit is a picture of a moonlit cloud movingacross the sky. But superimposed on thecloud is a procession of figures in statelydance. In the centre is Sri Krishna playingon his flute, arn^ before and after are gopis(his girl companions) drifting with him and

with the cloud across the background ofnight. There is a solemn joy in every linea-ment of every figurea spontaneity of chastedelight controlled by some ritual of beautyand truth, which, because it is essential, hasno sense of being imposed. We feel that thesong of the procession is * wise and lovely,'as Shelley called the sons of Silenus (not-

, withstandingthe ill reput-ation of the sylvan divin-ity). The loveliness ofMr. Haldar's ' Rasalila ' ison the face of it. Its wis-dom is, as all wisdomshould be, implicit andpervasive. It comes to usas the answer to the pic-ture's challenge to themind as to what percep-tion of the mystery of theuniverse moved the artistto this exquisite integra-tion of mythology andnature. If an artist bornin the Christiai^ traditionwere to paint a pictureexpressing what is wrap-ped up in the Hebrewpoet's exclamation ' Theheavens declare the gloryof God, and the firma-ment showeth. His handi-works,' he would touch thesignificance of ' Rasalila 'with this difference, thatto the inner eye of theIndian artist the cloud isnot an objective manifest-ation of a quality of thecreator, but is essentiallyhimself, Purusha, the Di-vine energy, gives out the

A music of his creative de-sire and nature (prakriti)in all the alluding varia-tions of one substance

^ moves rhythmically inresponse. Our artist,if he were a poet in words, as he is incolours, could not sing, as Wordsworth did,* I wandered lonely as a cloud.' To himthere is no lonely cloud, for it is the dancingfeet of the Lord of Love that speeds themalong the sky.

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This is art at its highest, and thereforeits proper workthe work of revealing (notmerely uttering) the mystery of life; and itis characteristic of art at this level of signi-ficance that its mode is not symbolical butmetaphorical. Elsewhere'^ I have tried toset forth at length the differences in thesetwo modes of expression in the arts. Here Ican only refer to them to the extent that thereference may enable us to appreciate thiselement in Mr. Haldar's art. The symbolicalmethod takes one thing to stand as a kind ofcode signal for another, as the cross for self-sacrihce, or the monkey (by association inIndia with the story of the Ramayana) forfidelity. The symbol and the thing symbo-lised enter the mind separately. This is themode of intellect as used by the English sym-bolical painters, G. F. Watts and NoelPaton. To say that a hero had a heart like alion's is to put two hearts in the field of con-sciousness, the lion's heart being the symbolof the man's bravery. A peculiar result ofthis method is that the quality of the symbolassumes the place of importance in the mind.We think of the lion as superior in braveryto the man. The symbol usurps the place ofthe subject. If we understand this processwe understzmd why dogma and external ob-servance gradually take the place of realisa-tion and life in the history of the religions.Metaphor makes an instantaneous identifi-cation of the visuzJ figure and the thing signi-fied. To say that a hero had a lion's heart isto telescope the figure of speech and the sub-ject. Some transfer of quality from thefigure to the subject takes place here also;but, speaking generally, the metaphoricalmode has less danger for the subject thanthe symbolical. We may state the differ-ence in a phrase thussymbolism indicatessomething else; metaphor indicates some-thing more.

There are three pictures of Mr. Haldar'swhich show this power of adding a * little'more (and how much it is!)' One is the pic-ture of Shiva and Parvati (PI. Ill A)depicting the incident of Shiva's comingin disguise to his consort and tellingher things unfavourable to the characterof her husband (himself disguised).

'^Symbol and Metaphor in Art, Shama'a, July1921.

Parvati refuses to believe the allega-tions and tries to break away from thestory-teller. At this moment (which is themoment of the picture) the Lord of Creationreveals himself in his true form to his shakti(power). In the sky, beyond a vista of thesnowy HimeJayas, the crescent moon is sodisposed as to rest on the head of Shiva, thusentangling the Divine Being with the wholeof creation. Here the artist accepts the tra-,ditional Hindu mythos, and makes his ownaddition to the personal manifestation ofdivinity he adds the cosmic. In * Dawn ' heused natural symbolism. A darkly drapedand sleepy woman figure stands in front of awide awake golden man-figure who is chap-leted and carries a flower. The man is say-ing something in the ear of the woman. Weinfer a command of departure. The title in-dicates the symbolism at one level, but thereis an imitation in the picture to the contem-plation of dawnings besides those of a newday in the calendardawnings in the heartwhen flower-bearing hope sent despair outof doors, dawnings in the mind when illum-ination followed doubt, and dawnings deeperand vaster in the soul of humanity and theuniverse. In ' The Spirit of the Storm ' Mr.Haldar is metaphorical. In the midst of afinely realised stormy sky there are flashesof lightning and a deluged rain. One feelsas if raised to the dizzy and fascinating centreof a tropical cyclone. Then the cloud-shapes resolve themselves into the figure ofa woman with hand outstretched flinging onto the thirsty earth, from the heart of cosanicsolicitude for human well-being, the boister-ous benediction of the monsoon. [One couldfollow out his idea in other pictures, but exi-gencies of space forbid.] Here also one couldmeet the obvious objection to reading into thepictures more than the artist intended. Thephilosophical and psychological fallacyinvolved in the objection may well form thesubstance of another study. In Mr. Haldar'scase we are left in no doubt as to his attitudeto his art. It is set forth in his striking watercolour entitled ' Shilpir Mohavanga ' (theend of the artist's illusion) (PI. Ill B) aboutwhich Mr. Haldar has given me the follow-ing note:. 'An artist's object is not merelyto create form. He has a higher aim,namely, to symbolise eternal Beauty andTruth through the medium of his creation.

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If what he creates fails to signify idealBeauty and Truth, his art becomes unbear-able to him. The ideal and the real whichare one in his mind, become divorced inactual expression and he is ready to destroythat which has failed to give him true joy.When the Creator (Mahadeva) observesuntruth in the midst of his creation (whichis Truth), he assumes the form of Rudra(the destroyer) to annihilate the falsehood.This picture represents a sculptor in the actof finishing his work. But in the verymoment of its completion he destroysit, for the image that has come out of thestone is not that which is in his mind, it hasfailed to express the ideal Beauty and Truth,and has expressed instead the desire of theflesh.'The late Sister Nivedita noted the meta-phorical power of enlarged suggestion in Mr.Haldar's works, and wrote as follows of* The Vina ' (Coll. Mr. Jennings). * We havehere a small work of indescribable beautyof drawing colour and setting. The richautumn tints yield to an equally rich blueover head. The terrace roof, at nightfall orat dawn, suggests vastness or solitude fitfor the dreaming attitude and pensive air ofthe woman in the fore-ground. We can al-most hear the faint sweet notes of thevina in her hand, as she seeks for the songof the heart *The work of the Bengal artists has beencriticised for its not being * true to nature.*The criticism is pointless where it is applied

to pictures of mythological personages whoare ' supernaturzJ.' Applied to certain ofMr. Haldar's pictures that rest on the solidearth there may be granted a few moments'justification of the charge of anatomical li-censebut if that few moments' space isemployed in an attempt to realise the methodand purport of Mr. Haldar's art, as alreadyset out by himself above, the charge will, Ithink, be withdrawn. Mr. Haldar is, as Ihave already said, a poet in colour, and he isentitled to as much divergence from the strict* truth to nature ' of photographic art as thedivergence to which the poet in words is en-titled from the strict canon of prose. Noone speaks as poetry speaks. No one seesas poetical painting sees. ' I stood tiptoe upona little hill ' is a line of pure poetry, but itwas the poetry that stood tiptoe, not thepoet. The tiptoe mood and vision (i.e.,painting as in poetry) must have tiptoeexpression even though the poet or artistcould no more stand on the tips of his toesthan on the tips of his fingers.Mr. Asit Kumar Haldar is just overthirty years of age, and with a family here-dity of artistic taste and achievement rein-forcing the natural responsiveness of his owngenius to the Rasalila that found expres-sion in Ajanta over a thousand years ago, andin finding expression to-day in Bengzd, shoulddelight lovers of art with a long line of worksto which the exponents of the coming art-criticism, based on sgiritual values, may turnfor inspiration and ratification.

II.- THE CREATIVE IDEAL.By RABINDRA NATH TAGORE.

TN a,an old Sanskrit book there is a versewhich describes the essential elementsa picture. The first in order is

' rupa-bheda,' separateness of forms.Forms are many, forms are different,each of them having its limits. But if thiswere absolute, if all forms remained obstin-ately separate, then there would be a fear-ful loneliness of multitude. But the variedforms, in their very separateness, must carrysomething which indicates the paradox oftheir ultimate unity, otherwise there wouldbe no creation.

So in the same verse, after the enumera-tion of separateness, comes that ofpramanani propor^tions. Proportions indi-cate relationship, the principle of mutualaccomodation. A leg dismembered from,the body has the fullest license tomake a caricature of itself. But asa member of the body it has its res-ponsibility to the living unity which rules thebody; it must behave properly, it must keepits proportions. If by some monstrous chanceof physiological profiteering it could out-grow by yards its fellow stalker, fhen we

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know what a picture it would offer to thespectator and what embarrassment to thebody itself. Any attempt to overcome thelaw of proportion altogether and to assertabsolute separateness is rebellion; it meanseither running the gaunlet of the rest or re-maining segregated.The same Sanskrit word ' pramanani,'which in a book of aesthetics means propor-tions, in a book of logic mezms the proofs bywhich the truth of a proposition is ascertain-ed. All proofs of truth are credentials ofrelationship. Individual facts have to pro-duce such passports to show that they arenot excommunicated, that they are not abreak in the unity of the whole. The logicalrelationship in an intellectual proposition,and the aesthetic relationship indicated in theproportions of a work of art, both agree inone thing. They affirm that truth consistsnot in facts, but in harmony of facts. Aboutthis fundamental note of reality the poet hassaid, * Beauty is truth, truth beauty.'

Proportions which prove relativity,form the outward language of creative ideals.A crowd of men is desultory, but in a marchof soldiers every man keeps his proportion oftime and space, and relative movement, whichmakes him one with the whole vast army.But this is not all. The creation of an armyhas for its inner principle one single idea ofthe general. According to the nature of thatruling idea, a production is either a work ofart or a mere orgamisation. All the materialsand regulations of a joint stock companyhave the unity of an inner motive. But theexpression of this unity itself is not the end;it ever indicates an ulterior purpose. On theother hand, the revelation of a work of art isfulfilment in itself.The consciousness of f>rsonality, whichis the consciousness of unity in ourselves, be-comes prominently distinct when coloured byjoy or sorrow, or some other emotion. It islike the sky, which is visible because it isblue, which takes different aspects with thechange of colours. Therefore for creationof art the energy of an emotional ideal isnecessary; for its unity is not like that of acrystal, passive and inert, but actively ex-pressive. Take for example the followingverse:"Oh, fly not. Pleasure, pleasant-hearted Pleasure,Fold me tty wngs, I prithee, yet and stay.

For my heart no metuureKnows no other treasureTo buy a garland for my love to-day."" And thou too, Sorrow, tender-hearted Sorrow,Thou gray-eyed mourner, fly not yet away,For I fain would borrowThy sad weeds to-morrow.To make a mourning for love's yesterday."

The words in this quotation, merelyshowing its metre, would have no appeal tous ; with all its perfection and its proportion,rhyme and cadence, it would only be a con-struction. But when it is the outer body ofan inner idea it assumes a personality. Theidea follows through the rhythm, permeatesthe words and throbs in their rise and fall.On the other hand, the mere idea of the abovequoted poem, stated in unrhythmic prose,would represent only a fact, inertly static,which would not bear repetition. But theemotional idea, incarnated in a rhythmicform, acquires the dynamic quality for thosethings which take part in the world's eternalpageantry.

Take the following doggerel:" Thirty days hath September,April, Ju|te and November."

The metre is there; therefore it simu-lates the movement of life. But it finds nosynchronous response in the metre of ourheart-beats; it has not in its centre the livingidea which creates for itself an indivisibleunity. It is like a bag which is convenient,and not like a body which is inevitable.

This truth, implicit in our own work ofart, gives us the ?lue to the mystery of cre-ation. We find that the endless rhythmsof the world are not merely constructive;they strike our own heart-strings and pro-duce music.

TTierefore it is we feel that this worldis a creation ; that in its centre it has a livingidea which reveals itself in an eternal S3m[i-phony, played on innumerable instruments,all keeping perfect time. We know that thisgreat world-verse that runs from sky to skyis not made for the mere enumeration dffacts; it is not 'Thirty days hath Septem-ber;'it has its direct revelation in our de-light. That delight gives us the key to thetruth of existence; it is personality actingupon personalities through incessant mani-festations. The solicitor does not sing to hisclient, but the bridegroom does to his bride.

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And when our soul is stirred by the song, weknow it claims no fees from us, but bringsthe tribute of love and a call from the bride-groom.

It may be said that In pictorial and otherarts there are some designs that are purelydecorative and apparently have no living andinner ideal to express. But this cannot betrue. These decorations carry the emotionalmotive of the artist, which says: ' I find joyin my creation, it is good.' AH the languageof joy is beauty. It is necessary to note here,that joy is not pleasure and beauty is no mereprettiness. Joy is the outcome of the detach,ment from self, freedom of spirit. Beautyis that profound expression of reality whichsatisfies our hearts without any other allure-ments, but its own ultimate value. Whenin some pure moments of ecstasy we realisethis in the world around us, we see this world,not as merely existing, but as decorated in itsforms of sounds, colours, lines; we feel inour hearts that there is one, who through allthings proclaim : * I have joy in my creation.'

That was why the Sanskrit verse gaveus for the essential of a picture, not only themanifoldness of forms and the unity of theirproportions, but also bhavah, the emotionaJidea.

It is needless to say that upon a mereexpression of emotion,even the best ex-pression of it,can rest no criterion of art.The following poem is described by the poetas ' An earnest suit to his unkind mis-tress :

And wilt thou leave me thus?Say nay, say nay, for shame!To save thee from the blameOf all my grief and grame.And wilt thou leave me thus?

Say nay! say nay!'I am sure the poet would not be offended

if I expressed my doubts about the earnest-ness of his appeal or the truth of his avowednecessity. He is responsible for the lyric andnot for the sentiment which is a mere materi-al. The fire assumes diflFerent coloursaccording to the fuel used; but we do notdiscuss the fuel, only the flames. A lyric isindefinably more than the sentimentexpressed in it, as a rose is more than itssubstance. Let us take a poem in which the

earnestness of sentiment is truer and deeperthan the one I quoted above:'The sun

Closing his benediction.Sinks, and the darkening airThrills with the sense of the triumphing

night,Night with her train of starsAnd her great gift of sleep.So be my passing!My task accomplished and the long daydone.My wages taken, and in my heart.Some late lark singing,Let me be gathered to the quiet West,The sundown splendid and serene,

Death.'The sentiment expressed in this poemis a subject for a psychologist. But for apoem, the subject is completely merged in itspoetry like carbon in a living plant which thelover of plants ignores, leaving it for acharcoal-burner to seek.

This is why, when some storm of feelingsweeps across the country, art is under a dis-advantage. For in such an atmosphere theboisterous passion breaks through the cordonof harmony and thrusts itself forward as thesubject, which with its bulk and pressuredethrones the unity of creation. For a simi-lar reason most of the hymns used in churchessuffer from lack of poetry. For in them thedeliberate subject, assuming the first impor-tance, benumbs or kills the poem. Mostpatriotic poems have the same deficiency,they are like hill streams born of suddenshowers, which are more proud of their rockybeds than of their water currents; in themthe athletic and arrogant subject takes it forgranted that the poem is there to give itoccasion to display its muscles. The subjectis the material wealth for the sake of whichpoetry should never be tempted to barter hersoul, though the temptation should come inthe name and shape of public good or someusefulness. Between the artist and his artmust be that perfect detachment which is thepure medium of love. He must never makeuse of this love except for its own perfectexpression.

In every-day life our personality movesin a narrow circle of immediate self-interest.And therefore our feelings and events with-in that short range become prominent sub-jects for ourselves. In their vehement self-assertion they ignore their unity with the aJI.

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They rise up like obstructions, and obscuretheir own backgrounds. But art gives ourpersonality the disinterested freedom of theeternal, there to find it in its true perspective.To see our own home in flames is not to seefire in its verity. But the fire in the stars isthe fire in the heart of the infinite; there it isthe script of creation.Matthew Arnold, in his poem addressedto a nightingale, sings:

' Hark ! ah, the nightingaleThe tawn-throated.Hark! from that moon-lit cedar what aburstWhat triump! hark,what pain!'

But pain when met within the bound-aries of limited reality repels and hurts; itis discordant with the narrow scope of life.But the pain of some great martyrdom hasthe detachment of eternity. It appears in allits majesty, harmonious in the context ofeverlasting life; like the thunder-flash in thestormy sky, not on the laboratory wire.Pain on that scale has its harmony in greatlove; for by hurting love it reveals theinfinity of love in all its truth and beauty.On the other hand, the pain involved inbusiness insolvency is discordant: it killsand consumes till nothing remains but ashes.The poet sings:

' How thick the bursts come crowding throughthe leaves!

Eternal Passion!Eternal Pain!'And the truth of pain in eternity has

been sung by those very Vedic poets who hadsaid, * From joy has come forth all creation.'They say:

'Sa tapas tapatva sarvam asrajata Yadidamkincha.'

' God from the heat of his pain created all thatthere is.'The sacrifice which is in the heart of

creation is both joy and pain at the samemoment. Of this sings a village mystic inBengal:

' My eyes drown in the darkness of joy,My heart, like a lotus, closes its petals in therapture of the dark night.'That speaks of a joy, which is deep like

the blue sea, endless like the blue sky; whichhas the magnificence of the night and itslimitless darkness enfolds the radiant worldsin the awfulness of peace; it is the unfathoim-ed joy in which all sufferings are made onewith it.A poet of mediaeval India tells us abouthis source of inspiration in a poem contain-ing a question and an answer:

' Where were your songs, my bird, when youspent your nights in the nest?Was not all your pleasure stored therein?What makes you lose your heart to the sky, thesky that is limitless?'

The bird answers :' I had my pleasure while I rested within bounds.When I soared into the limitless, I found mysongs !'To detach the individual idea from its

confinement of every-day facts and give toits soaring wings the freedom of the univer-sal is the function of poetry. The ambitionof Macbeth, the jealousy of Othello, wouldbe at best sensational in police court proceed-ings, but in Shakespeare's dramas they arecarried among the flaming constellations,where creation throbs with Eternal Passion,Eternal Pain.

IILTHE AESTHETICS OF YOUNG INDIA.By BENOY KUMAR SARKAR.

1.TWO SPECIMENS OF ART APPRE-CIATIONA GIFTED Indian painter writes to me,from CalcutU (March 9th, 1921):* If I had spent years among themuseums emd exhibitions of Paris, I couldnever have reproduced a replica of that artin an Indian city.'

The artist's argument is thus worded:' People, including our greatest men, comeback from Europe, with a changed point ofview, which they cannot adjust to Indian con-ditions. Our ideas must live and grow onIndian conditions, however much our educa-tion and outlook may be finished and en-larged by foreign travels and intimate

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contact with, the living phases of a livingcivilisation.'The writer is not only an artist of dis-tinction, but is also the author of writingson several phases of Indian painting andsculpture. He is familiar, besides, with theart-history of the world in both its Asianand European developments.Almost in the same strain Mr. ' Agast-ya ' gives his reactions to the * Art of a Ben-gali Sculptor ' in the Modern Review forMay, 1921. Says he: 'Though the subjectis Indian there is nothing in it, which couldnot come from the chisel of a non-Indiansculptor. Indeed, our grievance is that inMr. Bose's (Fanindra Nath) works wesearch in vain for the revelation of the Indianmind of an Indian artist, the peculiarity ofhis point of view, and the traditions of hisgreat heritage.'

* Agastya ' also, like my friend thepainter, attacks the problem from the stand-point of a ' question larger than the meritsof his (Bose's) individual works.' * Whatis the value,' asks he, ' of a long training ina foreign country, which disqualifies anartist from recognizing and developing hisown national and racial genius? A nationcan no more borrow its art from abroadthan its literature.'The problem is explicitly stated by* Agastya ' in the following terms. ' Weare told,' writes he, ' that Mr. Bose perfect-ed his training by his travels in France andItaly. We are not told, if he ever studiedthe masterpieces of old Indian sculpture ajidextracted from them the lessons which noGreek marble or bronze could teach him.'Further, ' an Indian artist,' as we are as-sured by ' Agastya,' * is destined to tread apath not chosen by artists of other nationali-ties.'From his communication in theModernReview Mr. ' Agastya ' appears to be * anauthority of Indian sculpture.' He is at pre-sent, as may be gathered, engaged in deci-phering with his * old eyes dim with age *some of the * worm-eaten paJm-leaves onimage-making now rotting in the archivesof the Palace Library at Tanjore.* Con-sequently, he claims to be resting " in a placeof telescopic distance ' and to ' have a morecorrect perspective and a wider and a dis-passionate view of things, unattached by

temporary values or local considerations.'It must be added that ' Agastya ' also hascared to devote attention to Ruskin, Leigh-ton and other Westerners.

2.-THE CURRENT STANDARD OFiiESTHETIC APPRAISAL.These statements, coming, as they dofrom two authorities, might be strengthenedby passages from the writings of other Indian

writers, who are known to be connoisseursand art-historians, or art-critics. For, vir-tually with no exception the field of art-appreciation is being dominated in India byone and only one strand of thought. Andthis

' monistic ' critique of aesthetic vsdueswhich our archaeologists and essayists havechosen to advocate in season and out ofseason is essentially none other than whatEuro-American ' orientalists ' and ' friendsof the orient ' have propagated in regard tothe ' ideals ' of Asian ai't and civilisation.

There are two conceptions underlyingeach of the above specimens of art-appraisal.

First, there runs a hypothesis as to the' Indianness ' of Indian inspiration, i.e., thedistinctiveness of Hindu (or Indian?) geniusor in, other words, as to the sJleged antithes-is between the ' ideals of the ELast ' andthose of the West.

Secondly, both writers have pursued cer-tain canons in regard to the very nature andfunction of art itself. In their appreciationof paintings and sculptures, they seem to beguided exclusively by the subjects paintedand carved, in other words, by the story,legend, or literature of the pictorial and plas-tic arts. That is, while travelling in therealms of art they continue to be obsessedby the results of their studies in history,literary criticism, and anthropology.

This methodology of art-appreciationhas long awaited a challenge. It is theobject of the present communication to offerthis challenge.3.THE BOYCOTT OF WESTERN CULTURE.

Let us follow the first point in the cur-rent stsmdard of art-appreciation systemati-cally and comprehensively to its furthest lo-gical consequences.

If the exhibitions of paintings, sculp-tures and decorative arts conducted underthe auspices, say, of a salon like the^ociefedes Artistes Francois in Grand Palais

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(Paris) every spring, or the collections ofAssyro-Babylonian cylinders, Greek vases,Roman sarcophagi, Etruscan urns, thesafety-pins of Roman Gaul, the keys ofSaalburg, Renaissance bronzes, and themosaics, coins, and terra cottasof differentepochs in the museums of Europe andAmerica, and the studies concerning thesemonuments published in the monographs oflearned societies, or visits of investigation tothe edifices of Moscow, the basilica ofAlgeria, the Byzantine sphere of influence inAsia Minor and Eastern Europe, not to speakof the Acropolis and the Gothic Cathedrals,should have to be ruled out as of question-able importance in regard to the spiritualequipment of an Indian creator of art-forms,because, in sooth, the East is postulatedalways to have been and ever in the futureto remain different from the West, can wenot dogmatise, with the same emphasis,that writers of novels, dramas and lyricpoetry in modern Marathi, Urdu, Bengali,Hindi, Tamil and other Indian lang-uages are not likely to imbibe any inspira-tion or derive zmy creative suggestions fromWhitman, Browning, Sudermann, Ibsen,Dostoyevski, juid Hervieu? And yet whatelse is Indian literature of the last two gene-rations, but the product of India's intimateacquaintance with and assimilation of West-ern literary models?

If the frescoes of Ajeuita and the bas-reliefs of Bharhut, if the South Indian bronz-es and Rajput-Pahari illustrations, if thegopurams,theshikharasand the Indo-Mos-lem domes and minars are to exclude fromIndia's aesthetic vision, the superb architect-ural immensities engineered by the Ameri*can designers of sky-scrapers, the styles ofKiev and Novogorod, the glories of Florenceand Ravenna, the Parthenon and the NotreDame, why should not Kural, Kalidas, Vidya-pati, Tukaram and Tulsidas monopolise theimagination of every rising genius in thefield of Indian letters? Should Hari Nara-yan Apte have produced another volume ofAbhangs? Should the creator of BandeMataram have compiled another Katha-saritsagara ?

Pursuing the current logic of art-appre-ciation, we should have to dictate that Indiansmust by all means avoid the contact of La-voisier iuid his disciples, of Humboldt, Pas-

teur, Agassiz, Maxwell and Einstein, becausein order to be true to Hindu ' heritage,' it isnecessary to boycott everything that has ap-peared in the world, since Leibnitz, Descartesand Newton! No Indian, therefore, we mustaccordingly advise, should investigate theacoustics of the violin, because not much onthis subject is to be found, in the mediaevalSangita-ratnakara! And since the onlymechjmical engineering of which our greatencyclop^edi^^ \heBrihat Samhita, is awareis the dynamics of the bullock cart, no Indian,if he wishes to remain a loyal Indian, mustpry into the mysteries of the printing press,wireless telegraphy, the Zeppelin, and long-distance phones!From the identical standpoint, the stu-dent of Hindu heritage in polity should beasked to come forward, with the messagethat India's Indianness is to be found only inKautilya or that from the great vantageground of the Arthashastra and of theTamilinscription discovered at UttaramallurYoung India can afford to declare a contra-band of Rousseau, Washington, Mill, Maz-zini, Treitschke, and Lenin!

Perhaps the advocates of the currentmethod in art-appreciation will consider ourstudents of philosophy to be the best repre-sentatives of Indianness, and of the distinc-tive Hindu spirit, because during the periodof over half a century they have failed toproduce anything superior to mere para-phrases, translations and commentaries ofthe ancient DarsAanas, and have thus mar-vellously succeeded in demonstrating thatthey were incapable of assimilating and ex-tending the thought-world exhibited by mas-ters from Bacon to James and Wundt,And certainly, the apostles of Indian-ness of the Indian mind will as a matter, ofcourse, fail to appreciate the achievement,whatever be its worth, of Vivekanandasimply because on account of his Westernleavening, this Carlyle of Young India hap-pened to realise and exploit the dynamic pos-sibilities of a philosophy undreamt of byShamkaracharya.The absurdity of the current method-ology in the appraisal of life's values ispatent on the surface.4. ACHIEVEIMENTS OF THE MODERN MI!VD.Our Vishvakarma had succeeded in in-venting a bullock cart. He could not hit

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upon the steam engine. Is this >vhy thebullock cart is to stand for 'spirituality/and the steam engine for gross materialism?Is this why the bullock cart should be re-garded as the symbol of Hindu genius, andthe railway, and all that has followed it ofthe Western?But how old is the steam engine in theWest as an aid to transportation or manu-facture? This machine was unknown to theVishvakarn^as of Greece and Rome and ofEurope down to the French Revolution. Thedifference between the East and the West inmaterialism is then not a difference in* ideals,' but only a difference in time, whichcan be measured by decades.What the bullock cart is, to the steamengine, that is all that Hindu genius had pro-duced during the epochs of its creative his-tory to all that Western genius has producedduring, roughly speaking, the last two hun-dred years. Previous to the advent of therecent phase of civilisation East and Westran parallel, nay identical, in the * point ofview,' in * genius,' in * spirit.'

Here is a test case. The music of Bee-thoven, nay, the * harmonies,' ' symphon-ies ' . and . * overtures ' of modern Europewould have been as unintelligible in the Mid-dle Ages, to Dante, and his predecessors forinstance, as they are still unintelligible to usin Asia simply because we have not advancedfurther than the discoveries of our fore-fathers in the thirteenth century.

If to-day, an Indian ostad, but one whois conversant with the theory of Indianmusica condition perhaps very difficult tofulfil in the present state of the artwere toattempt mastering the technique of the great' composers,' a class of artists unknown inIndian tradition of this new West, and on thestrength of that equipment proceed to im-provise some novel forms for our own ragasand raginis, should he be condemned as adiletanttee or should he be appreciated as thetrue disciple of our own swadeshv Bharataand Dhananjaya? And if a failure, shouldhe not be honoured as the first term in along series of pioneering experiments?The instance of music is offered as atypical problem for Youn^ India, becausemusic is perhaps the line of creative activityin which Indian ' genius ' has taken theleast step forward in centuries. Even the

elementary work of matching appropriate' chords ' to the notes of a melody or of de-vising a musical notation has not been at-tempted as yet.

5. THE ALLEGED INDIAN POINT OFVIEW.From achievements, let us pass on to the

analysis of ideals, the same problem, in fact,turned inside out. The question may reason-ably be asked: What is the Indian spirit?What is the distinctive Hindu or Orientideal?

Is it to be detected in the charkha, thehandloom, and in cottage industry? But pre-vious to the ' industrial revolution ' mankindnowhere knew of weaving factories, a Mas-sachusetts Institute of Technology, and theKrupp Workshops.

In the * village communities,' those so-called rural republics as every Indian haslearned to repeat ad nauseam since the pub-lication of Metcalfe's Report? But Englandalso should appear to be quite possessed ofthe Hindu spirit because there, says Gomme,the anthropologist and historian of civics, the* localities ' have * survived all shocks, allrevolutions, all changes, and their positionon the map of England is as indestructibleas the country itself.' Has Metcalfe saidanything more or different about India, thecountry, sat generis of panchayat and * localgovernment?''

In agriculture? But all through theages civilisation has fundamentally been agri-cultural. And to-day not only in France,Russia and Germany, but even in the UnitedStaftes agriculture, including o-se(;a (or cow-* worship'), is the greatest single occupa-tion of the people.

In land revenue as the principal item ofpublic finance? But the backbone of the na-tional treasury, even under the Roman Em-pire, was furnished by the realisations fromland, nay, from crown-land.

In the shrenis, ganas, corporation oi*gilds? But these economico-political unionshave served the same social, religious, ethi-cal, literary, and artistic functions of theEuropeans in the Middle Ages, as in India.

In monasticism and sadhuism ? But ina religious map, say, of Englzuid in the six-teenth century, previous to the dissolution ofmonasteries, the country will appear to have

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been dotted over almost, with as many ca-thedrals, churches, ashrams, mathas, tapo-vans, ' forests,' as our own punyabhumi,sacred Motherland.

In the sanctity of the home and in thereverence for the female sex? But even in1921, entire Latin Europe, as we understandfrom Joseph-Barthelemy, the liberal suffra-gist, in his Le Vote des Femmes, is disposed,although without purdah, to look with dis-favour on the public and political activitiesof women. And in the Anglo-Saxon world,even in go-ahead America, although the tre-mendous economic developments of the lastcentury have inevitably led on to the recogni-tion of the independent status of the womanin law and politics, it is the ' society,' obsess-ed as it is with the ideal of the Hausfrau,which still rules the ' proprieties ' of the* eternal feminine ' in the daughter, the bride,the wife, and the mother.What, then, are the elements in theIndian * atmosphere,' which differentiate it,whether item by item or ensemble, fromother atmospheres? Where are to be dis-covered the specifically Indian * traditions 'of human evolution?In the ' enlightened despotism and paxsarva-bhaumica (peace of the world-empire)of the Mauryas, Guptas, Palas, Cholas, Mog-huls, and Marathas? But one has only toenvisage Versailles or study the seventeenthcentury of European civilisation with openmind in order to be convinced that there hasnot occured anything in the history of theworld since the days of the ancient Egyptiansmore dehumanising and demorsdising thanthe autocracy, intolerance, luxury, effeminacyand licentiousness, which Europe has exhibit-ed, under her Bourbon and other Pharaohs.

6.RACE-IDEALS IN FINE ARTS.Perhaps here one should be Interrupted

with the remark that the rasas or emotionswith which paintings and sculptures deal be-long to a category altogether distinct fromthe psychological processes involved in themaking of exact science, industrial technique,material inventions, and social or political in-stitution. Iv might be suggested in otherw^ords that although the sciences may be con-ceded to be universal, international, cosmopo-litan, or human, fine arts are on the contraryessentially racial, national, local or regional.

For the present we need not enter intoa discussion as to the correct physiologicaland psychological basis of the mentalitiesoperating in the different orders of creation.We shall only single out certain types fromthe art-history of the world at random andexamine if they really point to any psycholo-gical diversity, any divergence in rasa be-tween race and race.

Let us consider the epochs of Europeanart previous to the moderns, say previous toDa Vinci, Rembrandt, and Velazquez. Thesociology of that Western art will be foundto be governed by the same rasas, the sameideals, whatever they be, as that of the Hin-du. We have only to visit the galleries or goaround the world with eyes open, i.e., withan eye to the ' pragmatic ' meaning of thediverse art-forms in the life's scheme of thedifferent peoples.The sculptures of Greece and their Ro-man copies do not tell any story differentfrom the images of the Hindu gods and god-desses. The art of Catholic Europe (bothRoman and Greek Church), embodied in thearchitecture, painting, stained glass, mosaic,bas-relief, and statue, is one continuous wor-ship of the unknown, the infinite, and thehereafter, which the Hindu or the Buddhistconsiders to be a monopoly of his own shil-pa-shastra and temple paraphernalia.

Ecclesiastical art was practically the onlyart of Europe until about three centuries ago.From an ' intensive ' study of the NotreDame alone (such as the orientalists andarchaeologists are used to bestow on ourAjantas and Bharhuts), from an analysis ofthe elongated statues, the design of parallels,the transcendentallsed anatomies, the moralson the fascade, the chimerical animals on theroofings, the ritualistic basis of its internalarrangements, and the metaphysics of itsmystical theology any Asian can satisfy him-self as to the existence in Western civilisa-tion of everything which he considers to beessential to ' spirituality.'To what extent has this old religiousmentality or superstitious attitude disappear-ed from modern Europe? Even to-day aCatholic priest is shocked to see the nudes inthe Museum of Fine Arts at Boston or in theLuxembourg galleries at Paris. While ex-amining the paintings and sculptures of thesaints or the illustrations of the Biblical

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13stories, should he chance to come across a* modem ' treatment somewhere hard by, heknows that he has committed a sin againstthe most important commandment. This isthe attitude also of every ' decent ' Christianwoman, specially among Catholics, the moreso in the villages. What more does Indian' intuition ' demand? And Catholicism is stillthe predominant religion in Euro-America.

Cornelius, Overbeck and other paintersof German romanticism in the early years ofthe last century must have out-Hindued theHindu in their practice of dhyana, yoga,meditation. In order to derive inspirationthey renounced their family ties, and cameall the way to ItaJy, because, verily, they be-lieved, as says Lewes in his Life of Goethe,that highest art was not achievable except bysadhus, sanyasis, Capucins and Rosicru-cians.Even in the ' idealistic ' interpretationof art-philosophy it is possible to find thealleged Hindu principles in Western specula-tion. If Croce's Italian Aesthetic is too con-temporaneous,one can cite Schillerfrom Ger-many of a few generations ago. For, sayshe, in his Use of the Chorus in Tragedy:' The aim of art is to make us absolutelyfree; and this it accomplishes by awakening,exercising zmd perfecting in us a power toremove to an objective distance the sensibleworld.' Here, then, we have a Europeanphilosopher preaching the Hindu doctrine ofmukti, moksha, freedom.

Nay, the art of Bolshevism counts amongits spiritual antecedents the same ' Hindumentality. As can be gathered from Reau'sRussie: Art Ancient, (or about two decadesprevious to the sovietic revolution of 1918,the art and craft circles of Young Russia hadcarried on a propaganda in favour of goingback to religious paintings, images, etc.

It is indeed absolutely necessary forevery student of a so-called Hindu type ofinspiration in art to be familiar with theChristian iconography and symbolism in theresearches of Martin, Cdiier, and Didron.More modern and novel eye-openers fromthe same standpoint will be Male's Art reli-gieux duXIIIe siecle (available in English)and Art religieux de la fin du moyen age.

Should we still have to suspect a differ-ence in life's attitudes between the East andthe West as exhibited in art-struittures, let

us observe the Napoleonic Arc de Triompheat Paris. The arch is a jayastambha likethe one our own Raghu constructed on theGangetic delta in Eastern Bengal, consecrat-ed to the victories of the grande armee from1792 to 1815. The sculptures illustrate thescenes in the history of revolutionary Francewith special reference to Austerlitz (1806).No man of common sense will dare re-mark that in this memorial of militaryglories Napolean or the French nation in-tended to display a characteristically Frenchor European ideal of civilisation. The obe-lisks and pylons of Luxor and Kamak hadanticipated the same ideals of mankind threethousand years ago. We may come to thePersia of Darius or even nearer home, andsay, that if a monument in stone were erect-ed by Samudragupta's architects and sculp-tors in order to illustrate the lengthy literarymonument composed by Harishena in hon-our of the emperor'sdigvifaya (conquest ofthe quarters) the descendants of the HinduNapolean would have always seen in theirown Rome the solid testimony to the sameEgyptian or French rasa (emotion).Where, then, are the distinctive racialtraits and psychological attitudes in theworld's architecture, sculpture, and paint-ing ? Nowhere. Such differences havenever existed in the mentality of which his-tory furnishes the objective evidence.

7. AESTHETIC REVOLUTION.But in the first place the moderns in Euro-America have succeeded in profoundly secu-

larising the arts. In the second place theyhave attained certain conspicuous results intechnique and treatment of the material. Itis questionable, however, if we can creditthem with the creation or discovery of anessentially new rasa, a characteristically mo-dern emotion, except, what is automaticallyimplied in the new subjects of secular ex-perience.Whether there have emerged some newemotions or not, the advance of the creativemind in technique is already too obvious.And continuing the previous parallelism onemay almost remark, although with great Cau-tion, in regard to the application and inter-pretation of the analogy in the field of aesthe-tics, that what the fishing canoe is to the sub-marine, that is all classic and Christian art to

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15^ntdeckungen could never dare suspecttAe utility of such investigations.But how much of these studies is realanalysis of rasa, genuine art-criticism? Ab-solutely nothing.

9. PHILOSOPHICAL ART-CRITICISM.Not all art critics, however, are exclu-

sively interested in these descriptive, histori-cal, economic, anthropological or sociologies^aspects of fine arts. There are connoisseurswho try to attack the problem from whatmay be called the psychological point of view.They analyse the ideas, the ideals, the * ninerasas, ' the message, or the philosophy of thepaintings and sculptures.When these art-philosophers see thelandscapes of Sesshiu, the great Japanesemaster of the fourteenth century, they readin the rasa of his pines, the symbolism forlongevity, in that of his bamboos the alle-gory of chastity, and in that of his plumsall that is implied by taste and elegance inbelles lettres.

If they come across Chinese silks depict-ing mountain scenes with snows and pinesor perhaps a solitary man seated in a certainpose these metaphysicians of aesthetics willdiscover therein the cool contemplative calmof Chinese consciousness conductive to thequest of the beyond.

In the same manner they would haveinterpreted at least half a dozen works ofCorot (1796-1875), his mornings, evenings,shepherds playing on the flute in moonlight,as philosophical allegories pointing to quie-scence, passivity, and the communion of thesoul with nature, were it not for the fact thatCorot happens to be a Frenchman and aEuropean and that ergfo the * message of theforest,' must by no means be attributed to abeef-eating materialistic Westerner!

Likewise w^ill these philosophical con-noisseurs find a mystery in the paintings il-lustrating Radha and Krishna, simply be-cause by their conventional pose and dressdescribed in literature, the figures can easilybe identified as the sacred persons of semi-mythical tradition. With equal energy dosuch critics run into ecstasy over a Giotto's(1276-1337) St. Francis receiving thewounds of Jesus on his own person, or overa Murillo, the Spanish master's (1616-1682)Immaculate Conception and Angel's

Kitchen, because these stories possess aspiritual ' polarisation in the folk-psychooetry, if I say that Jo-gindra Nath Bose has produced a great epicbecause it deals with Shivaji, a historic hero,or because his Prithviraj is a call to nationalunity, or that Rajani Kanta Sen is a greatpoet because he writes devotional hymns, orthat the poets of Young Bengal are perform-ing great things in poetry because they singto the country, to nationalism, and to

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demo|:racy, am I using the language ofpoet/y? None at all.The message does not make poetry. Thesubject-matter does not make poetry great.The subject-matter, the message, thephilosophy, the social ideal, the * criticism oflife ' may have to be appreciated or condemn-ed on their own merits. But poetry itselfwill have to stand on its own dignity. Youmay condemn the rasas dealt with in a work,i.e., the message of the author from your par-ticular ethical point of view and yet you mayworship him as a great poet.One does not have to be a Roman Catho-lic in order to feel that the author of the Di-vine Comedy is a first class creator of char-acters and situations, of problems and possi-bilities. Paradise Lost does not depend forits strength on the cult of militant puritan-ism on which it is reared. Men, who are thefurthest removed from the religious contro-versies and political rasas of the Englishpeople in the seventeenth century, or of theItalians in the thirteenth, can feel in that at-mosphere of these two creations the titanicmight of Himalayan upheavals.Whatever be the subject-matter, the poetwill have to be judged as poet solely by hismanipulations, his treatment of the material,the machinery he has invented in order tomake the material speak, the individualityand fruitfulness of his technique. We needonly ask: What new personalities have beenmanufactured by the author? What newattitudes and rearrangements of ideas?What devices, what complexities, what sur-prises? Are the creations attempted impor-tant, integral, and organic enough to enrichhuman experience?

The autonomy of poetry as a mode ofliterary expression depends on the ' artisticnecessity ' pervading, as it must, the organ-ism of vital situations and ideas. Not tocreate this artistic necessity through the me-dium of language is not to be a poet. To failto discover and appreciate this artistic neces-sity is to fail in understanding poetry.

12. THE ART-IN-ITSELF OR PURE ART.We should now be able to analyse andunderstand the artistic necessities in paint-ing and sculpture.Let us begin with a simple query in re-gard to modern French paintings: How do

the Cezannes differ from the Corots in so faras both Cezanne and Corot are landscapists?If you wish to detect a Chinese Tao or aWordsworthian " Nature's Holy Plan," youare at liberty to interpret both these mastersalike. But wherein lies the individuality ofeach as shilpin, as artist? How has eachcreated his own beauties, his own * messageof the forest?' Here, then, we have to findsome new criterion of art. The problem liesin the how.

Indeed, when we are face to face withone thousand landscapes executed by severalhundred painters, and get used to viewingthem from different angles and in differentmoods, all those descriptive, historical philo-sophical and idealistic criticisms are boundto disappear. We are forced to meditate uponthe art-in-itself, the only feature in all theseproductions, which is of supreme importanceto the painters themselves, in other words,upon * pure ' art.

The same problem arises when we arein a gallery of sculptures, where the exhibitsare to be counted by hundreds, and includingthe miniatures, by thousands. The questionof photographic likeness or the symbolism ofthe executions then retires into the back-ground; and even in spite of ourselves realaesthetic criticism makes its appearance. Webegin to discuss the ' hows ' of each master-piece.

It is possible for some, while to remainsatisfied with cataloguing the Natarajas asSouth Indian and Sinhalese, the Buddhas andTaras in terms of latitude and longitude, theApollos and Venuses according to the cities,where they were unearthed, and the Madon-nas according as their pose agrees, with orvaries from the Cimabue patent. One mayalso enjoy a diversion by classifying the dis-tortions in anatomy as much from the Pha-raonic, the Aegean, Korean, Japanese andHindu executions as from the statues on thefacade of the treasury at Delphi or from thoseon the portals and tympanum of the cathe-drals in France.

But the multitude of specimens and theplurality of types, inevitable as they are,compel us at last to come down to the funda-mentals of beauty and truth in shilpa andto try to decipher the alphabet of plastic andpictorial art.

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13. THE ALPHABET OF BEAUTY.Drawing, painting, bas-relief and sculp-

ture deal with the subject-matter of anatomy,botany, and the other branches of naturalhistory, but they are not governed by thesesciences. These arts are regulated by thescience of space, geometry, the vidya ofrupam. the knowledge of form, morphology.The language of the painter and thesculptor is, therefore, point, line, angle, cone,square, curve, mass, volume. The creatorsof beauty speak, the vocabulary of positions,magnitudes, dimensions, perspectives. If weare to associate with the manipulators ofthese forms, we must learn how to employthe terminology of obliques and parallelo-grams, prisms and pentagons. We must alsohave to practice understanding the message,which in every instance is spiritual, of thelumps, patches, contours, balls, depths, andheights.We can only make ourselves a nuisancein the company of painters and sculptors ifwe speak a jargon, which is utterly incom-prehensible to them. Such jargons, not tobe found in the dictionary of art, are thetechnical terms known as the tibia, the clavi-cle, the cerebellum, the stirnum, the pelvicgirdle. Other jargons like these are the di-cotyledons, the conifers, the palmates, thepinnates. More such jargons are love, anger,hatred, msJice, compassion, and the rest ofthe rasas, whatever be their number accord-ing to the latest experiments in * individualpsychology.'To dLshilpin there is only one organ ofsense, and that is the eye. The artist doesnot, however, view the world as a theatre ofminerals, plants and animals, nor of the racesof men, with their physical, mental or emo-tional characteristics. In the geology andanthropogeography of art there are record-ed only the forms (and also the colours).The optic nerves, or for that matter, the en-tire sensibility of the artist as artist, cannotrespond to anything, but these shapes andhues, the most fundamentad * generalisa-tions ' that can be deduced out of the world'sstructure.And v/hat does the artist create? Notnecessarily the doubles or replicas noreven the interpretations or symbolisms of theforms which arrest his eyes, but whateverhis form-sense, his rasa-jnana, tfctates to

him as worth creating. If out of his rea Jingsof the crystallography of the univers.^ hecan give birth to a type by his constructivewill, he is an artist. If he can render histypes readable, i.e., intelligible to the eyes ofhis fellowmen, in other words, if he can makehis creations, the progeny of his form-sense,live in the imagination even of a section ofhis community, he is a master.

The creators of Apollos, Buddhas, Ma-donnas, Natarajas, Radhas, Shaktis, Venus-es, sMid VishnuE happen to be masters becausetheir rasa-jnana bodied forth these types outof ' air nothings ' endowing a * local habita-tion and a name ' to ' things unknown,' andbecause these formations will talk to humanbeings as long as the world endures,evenwhen the dialects of the human languagecease to be spoken, even when Greek mytho-logy. Buddhism, Mariolatory, and the otherconventional relic;ious systems of mankindbecome things of the past.The painter and the sculptor do not con-struct leaves, trunks, branches, arms, lips,thighs, loves, angers, hatreds. They areinterested solely in the juxtaposition offorms, in the intermarriage of shapes, in thepermutation and combination of masses andsurfaces.

There is a blank wall, or a blank sheet ofpaper, silk, or canvas. The function of theartist is to fill it with designs, necessarily ofgeometry, but not necessarily the Euclid ofthe class-room. It is a geometry whichserves the form-sense of the shilpin.

Or, there is a log of wood, a lump of clay,or block of stone. The function of the sculp-tor is simply to fashion out of this dead massan organism of objects in space. The struc-ture will naturally be made of cones, cavities,flats.

Perhaps we have already before us aNataruja of Ceylon, a Venus of Melos, a Bud-dhist or Christian animal in prayer, or anImmaculate Conception. But the * realityof these formations from the painter's orsculpor's geometry is not to be tested by*heir resemblance with or divergence fromthe type~B that are known to exist on earth.These rupams have a validity all their own.The geometry of Maya or Vishvakarmahas architectured a new world, the denizensof which are, ipso facto, as real as anythingflesh and blood, or sap and tissue. The artist's

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20rapam has been created, i.e., only after athing of beauty has been manufactured toadd to the known forms in the universe. Itcan hardly be taught from mouth to mouth ina school of arts nor communicated from mas-ter to disciple in the studio of the artist.

The sculptor and the painter are not be-fore me to explain with a compass, as it werethe warps and woofs of their art-texture,why, for instance, their ' spacing ' is suchand such, or how they have been led to con-ceive such and such proportions in theirhandiwork. No, the formations must explainthemselves. Thfc key to the crystallographyof art is contained in the very specimens.

And their sole language is the voice ofTUpam, the vocabulary of masses, volumesand poses, and the necessary lights andshades. If these forms do not convey anymeaning to me about their morphology orstructural composition, either I have no eyefor art (an eye, which certainly is very rareamong men and women), or the artist him-self is a quack.

From the standpoint taken in the presentthesis, literary descriptions, however short,which it has been the custom to tag at thebottom of art-objects, are in almost everyinstance a hindrance to genuine art-apprecia-tion. Invariably they serve to shunt off theeye and the mind from the track of rasa,shilpa and shakti (genius) of the artistto absolutely irrelevant and extraneousmatters.

15.THE IDIOM OF PAINTING.Up till now it has been possible to speakof painting and sculpture in a parallel manneras if they were the same arts. But these twoarts are not identical as modes of creation.The language of the painter is substzmtiallydifferent from that of the sculptor. In theappreciation of art accordingly, in shilpa-ihastra, we have to employ two differentlanguages adapted to the two spheres.

So far as composition or art-crystallo-graphy is concerned, so far as artistic neces-sity is sought, so far as the organic consisten-cy of the whole is the object of our investi-ijation, painting and sculpture can be treatedm one and the same breath. But this com-position, this organic consistency, this logi-cal iieceity in the ftrt-texture is adueved in

sculpture in a manner quite different fromthat in painting.

The sculptor speaks essentially the lan-guage of dimensions. The painters' languageis essentially that of colour. The permuta-tion and combination of rupams and theirharmonic synthesis are brought about by thesculptor through his three dimensional solidswhereas for the same object the painter de-pends almost exclusively on the mixing oftints and gradation of colour.

It is not only the perspective that evokesvolume in the painter's work. Paintings be-come ' sculpturesque ' or three-dimensionedthrough colour also. The American MaxWeber's blues have the solid texture ofChinese porcelains. The French Renoir'smetallic red brings forth the volumes of hu-man flesh.The brush can achieve what the chiseldoes, viz., manufacture a structural com-position. The vidya of rupam, thescience of form, the geometry of aesthetics,thus bifurcates itself in two directions: thecomposition of plastic arts, and the art ofcolour-construction.

16.FORM AND VOLUME IN COLOUR.The question may naturally be asked:What does one mean, when one says that

colour is laid at the service of form? Howcan rupam be constructed out of colour?

Ordinarily colour is known merely toinfluence us with its tints. The agreeable-ness or disagreeableness of the effects onoptic nerves is the sole quality we general-ly attribute to the combination of hues pro-duced by the painter's artistic chemistry.

In India especially it is difficult to takecolour in any other association and conceivethe mechanics of hues in any other light.Because our art-history does not make usfamiliar with very many ' pure paintings.'

The paintings of ancient and mediaevalIndia should not be called paintings in thestrictest sense of the term. Most of thesespecimens are really ' drawings,' but col-oured drawings.

Our artists were primarily draftsmen.They made lines and constructed shapeswith the pen or the pencil, as it were. Those' pencil-sketches ' or designs were the mostimpcrrtant elements in the workmanship of

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Hindu shilpins. To them colour was verysecondary. It was added almost as a secondthought, so to speak, on the background ofthe surface prepared by the drawing.

Shall we call such pieces of old Indianshilpa paintings on the ground that theypossess a variety of tints and also display aremarkable discretion in the selection andtreatment of these tints? We can do so ifwe please only in the same manner, how-ever, in which we are entitled to describethe coloured bas-reliefs of Dehrel-bahri andother Pharaonic tombs as paintings.

Be this as it may, the point to notice,especially in connection with the handlingof colour, is that neither in coloured bas-reliefs nor in coloured drawings can we findthe mass, the depth, the volume, the short,the ' architectural ' or sculpturesque quali-ty which comes to our attention as soon aswe view a work in which the drawing is no-where, but in which the artist uses his brushand practically nothing but the brush. Itis this exclusive employment of the brushand the consequent manipulation of paint-ingSf without the support and backgroundof drawings, which is one of the greatestcontributions of the modem, especially ofthe contemporary Occident to the achieve-ments of mankind in rupam.

In such * pure paintings ' the idiom thatthe artist speaks is that of colour and no-thing but colour. It is with colour that heconstructs shapes, erects forms, bringsabout light and shade, arranges the perspec-tive, and redistributes the forces of naturefor the world of art. Colour alone has thusbeen made to evolve the dimensions of sculp-ture on canvas and to produce the harmonyof structural composition.

17. THE GEOMETRY OF SCULPTURE.Painting and sculptures are then uni-

versal in their appeal simply because theirspiritual basis is geometry, the most ab-stract and cosmopolitan of all vidyas.Curiously enough, anthropologically speak-ing, the primitive patterns and designs of allraces (including the ' savages ' of to-dayand the pre-historic forefathers of the' civilised ' nations of history) are prepon-derantly geometrical, strictly so called. Thespecimens of decorative arts,Peruvian,

American-Indian, Maori, Centra-African,with which we are familiar in the ethnolo-gical museums of the world, point over-whelmingly to the manipulation of lines, tri-angles, squares, hexagons, etc. (animaland plant devices must not be overlooked,however), in a manner for which a compa-ratively modern parallel is to be sought inthe * arabesque ' of Saracenic fine arts. Thesame universal principles of aesthetics canbe watched (allowance to be made for theindividuality of the master's creative rasajnana) in all epochs of art development, nomatter whatever be the latitude and longi-tude, whatever be the subject-matter, thesuperstition and the esperit des lois. *Take Plate III, Le Sommeil desFemmes, in Mallon's Quatcrze Sculptures,Indiennes. This piece of bas-relief consistsof two horizontal sections, one-third at thetop being devoted to two semi-circles enclos-ing an inner triangle with the vertex cut out.The principal two-thirds is divided,again, vertically into two sections, two-thirds of which at the left forms a square.This square is divided horizontally into twosections, of which the lower rectangle ismore full than the upper. The figureseated erect helps making a small squareto the left and an agreeable rectanglewith the reclining forms to the right.It reaches right up to the parallelogram atthe top with a ball. It serves also with across to connect the shapes in the rectangleat the bottom with the top. The verti-cal parallelogram at the right consistsof two figures of which one is erect.The lower half of this figure is coveredby a parabolic shape, thoroughly sup-ple and pliant, the two extremities of whichare firmly fixed on to a semi-elliptical cylin-der. We do not have to examine the pieceanatomically or anthropologically. Fromtop to bottom, from right to left we are hereviewing nothing but a drama of forms andthe interplay of light and shade. Everycurve tells a story to the eyes, every wavebrings its message to the spirit. We do notcare to know if it is a Buddha seated, or aYasodhara sleeping, or the women of theconcert party enjoying repose on the spit.We do not have to inquire if the piece comes *

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from Afghanistan, if the artists are CentralAsian, Hellenistic, or Indian, if the legend isderived from the Jatakas.We feel that the sculptor has contri-buted to the experiences of our life anothercreation of shapes, another truth in patternsand designs, another thing of beauty whichis a joy for ever and to all mankind. Onemay view the piece from any angle, to beextreme, even upside down. It will notlose its quality of composition in any event.The melody of rythmic contours in thisbas-relief is constant and perpetual.The composition there is very simple,almost elementary. Perhaps this is thereason why the pattern of this structure isto be found in its essential details as muchin ' pagan ' Greece as in Christian cathe-drals. Morphologically it is indeed anA. B. C. in art-formations. It is a real' primitive ' of art technique.A very close resemblance to this typeis furnished by Plate V, Le-Parinirvana.There, among other things, a special signifi-cance is to be attached to the oblique in thecentre, which to the reader of the story ismeant to indicate a person lying on the bed.But the artist's rasa-jnana has counselledhim to the effect that an ordinzo-y horizontalwould not have provided the desired effect.He wants to create an aesthetic diversionin the midst of the monotonous group ofparallel verticals.A religious devotee will perhaps see inthis piece one of the most solemn incidentsvisualised in stone. But in art-apprecia-tion, in shilpa-shastra, it is nothing but the* mystery ' of an inclined plane which hasbeen exploited by the sculptor in an exqui-site manner. Where is the artist or the art-critic who will have to be told the story ofthe ' Great Passing Away ' in order to beresponsive to the call of these universals insculptural geometry ?We czm then understand easily whyNataraja is one of the most signal contribu-tions of India to the history of the world'ssculpture. To the anthropologist it is per-haps a Dravidian devil in his Baochanalianorgies, to the mystic it is an emblem ofthe cosmic music of the world-process, or,mc.y be, of something in tvme with theInfinite; to the student of literature it is but

a Tamil embodiment in bronze of a Shaivastory.

But to the sculptor with his rasa-jnana,his sense of form and composition, where-ever he be, but to one who speaks his ownlanguage and is true to his shilpa, Natarajais a most original creation in the ripple ofbends and joints. The balancing of diversemasses in motion, the swaying of thevolumes away from one another, the con-struction of imaginary circles within circles,the grouping of unseen parallels in move-ments and poses, and the gravitation of allthe varied shapes to a common centre ofdynamic rhythmall these constitute anepoch-making attainment of unity indiversity, of the correlation of matter andmotion, which possesses a meaning in theidiom of rupam as much to the Western asto the Eastern artist.To a student of the geometry of dancethe fantasy of forms exhibited by theSinhalese or South Indian Nataraja will notfail to suggest the design of the group ofdancing figure on the facade of the Operaat Paris (for which, by the bye, Americanmillionaires are said to have offered a priceworth its weight in gold). The TaanilNataraja type of sculpture-formation is oneof the permanent glories of man's creativeelan (shakti).

18. THE MECHANISM OF COLOURCONSTRUCTION.We shall now mention some achieve-ments in colour construction to illustrate theimiversaJ in artistic geometry.Every painter has an idiom of his ownin the matter of spacing and grouping.Among the moderns Cezanne, for instance,has created a type of composition, almost aformula, which he has followed in nearlyall his major ^/orks. Whether the shapesbe trees, or fruits, or human figures, thismaster begins by dividing his canvas by avertical structure almost into two equaldivisions. The right and the left as well asthe top and the bottom are then filled insuch details as will evoke a sense of theirbalancing and belonging to each other.

Cezanne's anatomies are always ques-tionable like those of the old Spanish masterGreco (sixteenth century). But his colour-masses have an undeniable effect as much

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22because of his symmetry of construction ason . account of the sense of proportion heobserves in the handling of different tints.

Corot's geometry is altogetherdifferent. The parts of his canvas do notbalance one another as in a symmetricalscheme. He produces his volumes invari-ably by dark greys of which nearly theentire gamut is laid under contribution.The harmony of shapes thus created poss-esses a characteristic individuality whichmarks off the maker from other designers oflandscapes.

But let us sample out some of the greatmasters of old. Andrea Del Sarto (1487-1531) has a piece at the bottom of whichthere is the caption, Charity. But what willa person see here who does not know how toread, whose sole capital is his eye-sight ?A Hindu pearl merchant who was present inone of my trips to the Louvre remarked:* The face looks quite Italian, doesn't it?'especially because he can read French andknows that the picture is exhibited in theItalian rooms ! My guide-book says that themodel for the artist's figure was always* his beautiful but dissolute wife whoruined and then deserted him." What,now, is the art-value of this piece ?As in reproduction we cannot watch theeffects of colour-harmony, we have to besatisfied in the present examination exclu-sively with noting the structural compositionin the abstract. If we want a parall