The Loves of Krishna in Indian Painting and Poetry Part 10

In one picture he is 'a gallant whose word cannot be trusted' and we see him in the act of delicately disengaging a lady's dress and gazing at her with pa.s.sion-haunted eyes. The poem on the reverse runs as follows:

Showing her a beautiful girdle Drawing on a fair panel with red chalk Putting a bracelet on her wrists And laying a necklace on her b.r.e.a.s.t.s Winning the confidence of the fawn-eyed lady of fair brows He slyly loosens the knot of her skirt Below the girdle-stead, with naughty hand.[99]

In another picture, he appears as 'a gallant well versed in the ways of courtesans,' the dreaded seducer of inexperienced girls. He is now shown approaching a formal pavilion, set in a lonely field. Inside the pavilion is the lovely object of his attack, sitting with a companion, knowing that w.i.l.l.y-nilly she must shortly yield yet timidly making show of maidenly reserve.

His swollen heart Knows neither shame nor pity Nor any fear of anger How can such a tender bud as I Be cast into his hands today?[100]

In yet a third picture, he is portrayed standing outside a house while the lady, the subject of his pa.s.sions, sits within. He is once again 'a false gallant,' his amorous intentions being shown by the orange, a conventional symbol for the b.r.e.a.s.t.s, poised lightly in his hand. As the lady turns to greet him, she puts a dot in the circle which she has just drawn on the wall--a gesture which once again contains a hint of s.e.x. On the picture's reverse the poem records a _conversation galante_.

'Beloved, what are you doing With a golden orange in your hand?'

So said the moon-faced one Placing a dot On the bright circles Painted in the house. [101]

In other pictures, a clown or jester appears, introducing a witty joking element into the scene and thus presenting Krishna's att.i.tude to love as all-inclusive.

From 1693, the year of Raja Kirpal's death, painting at Basohli concentrated mainly on portraying rulers and on ill.u.s.trating _ragas_ and _raginis_--the poems which interpreted the moods and spirit of music. The style maintained its fierce intensity but there was now a gradual rounding of faces and figures, leading to a slight softening of the former brusque vigour. Devotion to Krishna does not seem to have bulked quite so largely in the minds of later Basohli rulers, although the cult itself may well have continued to exert a strong emotional appeal. In 1730, a Basohli princess, the lady Manaku, commissioned a set of ill.u.s.trations to the _Gita Govinda_ and Krishna's power to enchant not only the male but also the female mind was once again demonstrated.[102]

This series of ill.u.s.trations is in some ways a turning point in Indian painting for not only was it to serve as a model and inspiration to later artists but its production brings to a close the most creative phase in Basohli art. After 1730, painting continued to be practised there but no longer with the same fervour. Basohli artists seem to have carried the style to other states--to Guler, Jammu, Chamba, Kulu, Nurpur and Bilaspur--but it is not until 1770 that the Krishna theme again comes into prominence. In about this year, artists from Guler migrated to the distant Garhwal, a large and straggling state at the far south of the Punjab Hills, taking with them a style of exquisite naturalism which had gradually reached maturity under the Guler ruler, Raja Govardhan Singh.[103] During his reign, a family of Kashmiri Brahmans skilled in the Mughal technique had joined his court and had there absorbed a new romantic outlook. On at least three occasions they had ill.u.s.trated scenes from the _Bhagavata Purana_--Nanda celebrating Krishna's birth,[104]

Krishna rescuing Nanda from the python which had started to devour his foot,[105] and finally the game of blind man's bluff[106]--but their chief subject had been the tender enchantments of courtly love. Ladies were portrayed longing for their lovers. The greatest emphasis was placed on elegance of pose. Fierce distortions were gradually discarded and the whole purpose of painting was to dwell on exquisite figures and to suggest a rapt devotion to the needs of love.

It is this suavely delicate art which now appears in Garhwal. Among the Guler painters was a master-artist and although his first Garhwal pictures are concerned with pa.s.sionate romance, devotion to Krishna quickly becomes apparent.[107] The great Alaknanda River which roared through Srinagar, the capital, had a special fascination for him and just as Leonardo da Vinci evinced at one time a pa.s.sionate interest in springing curls, the Guler artist found a special excitement in winding eddies and das.h.i.+ng water. The result was a sudden new interpretation of the Krishna theme. In two pictures where Krishna is shown quelling the snake Kaliya,[108] all the Guler qualities of elegant naturalism are abundantly present. Each figure has a smooth suavity and in every face there appears a look of calm adoration. It is the swirling, curling water, however, which gives the pictures their special Garhwal quality. The play of water evokes a melody of line and the result is a sense of upsurging joy. A similar religious exaltation marks other pictures by this master. At some time he appears to have been commissioned to ill.u.s.trate the tale of Sudama the poor Brahman whose tattered hovel is changed by Krishna into a golden palace. He was evidently a.s.sisted by a weaker painter but in the pictures which are clearly his own work, the same quality of lyrical incantation appears. As Sudama journeys to Dwarka Krishna's golden city, his heart swoons with adoration, the hills, trees and ocean appear to dance about him and once again, the linear music of the composition engenders a feeling of supreme ecstasy.[109] We do not know which member of the Garhwal court acted as his patron--it is even possible that it was not the ruler himself but his consort, the Guler princess whom he had married in about the year 1770. What, at any rate, is clear is that at least one lively adorer of Krishna existed at the Garhwal court and that until the Gurkha invasions of 1803, there were other painters, besides the master-artist, who were similarly encouraged to interpret the Krishna theme.[110] Their style was clearly influenced by that of the master but in their use of slender leafless branches and towering spikes of blossom, they developed a special Garhwal imagery designed to suggest the slender beauty of love-enchanted girls. After the expulsion of the Gurkhas in 1816, a new Raja revived Garhwal painting. Krishna the lover was once again portrayed and until the middle of the nineteenth century, pictures continued to be produced blending the delights of courtly pa.s.sion with adoration of G.o.d.

It was in the state of Kangra, however, that the greatest developments occurred. In 1775, the young Sansar Chand became Raja, and despite his extreme youth, quickly acquired mastery of the Kangra court. It is unlikely that artists were immediately summoned, but certainly by 1780 a flouris.h.i.+ng school of painters had come into existence.[111] As at Garhwal, the artists of Kangra came originally from Guler and thus a similar phenomenon arises--the Guler manner providing the basis for yet a second great style. Sansar Chand was obviously quite exceptional, for not only was he successful in politics and war, but from his early manhood was devoted to Krishna as lover G.o.d. And it is this all-absorbing interest which explains the vast expansion of painting which now occurred. Under Sansar Chand's stimulus artists began to portray every situation involving Krishna, the cowherd. He was shown as a baby crying for the moon, being washed by his foster-mother, Yasoda, or mischievously breaking pitchers full of curds. He would be painted strolling with the cowherds, playing on his flute, or bringing the cattle home at evening. But the main theme to which the artists constantly returned was his main cowgirl love. Radha would be shown standing with Krishna in the forest, gazing trustfully into his eyes, seeking shelter with him from the rain or sitting with him by a stream.[112] Sometimes she and the cowgirls were shown celebrating the spring festival of Holi, Krishna syringing them with tinted water while they themselves strove to return his onslaughts by throwing red powder.[113] Often the scene would s.h.i.+ft from the forest to the village, and Krishna would then be shown gazing at Radha as she dried herself after bathing or squatted in a courtyard cooking food. At other times he appeared a.s.sisting her at her toilet, helping her to dress her hair or applying a beauty mark to her forehead. If the scene was night itself, Radha would be shown sitting in her chamber, while far away across the courtyards and gardens would loom the small figure of Krishna waiting lonely on a bed. Occasionally the lovers would be portrayed expressing their rapture by means of simple gestures. Krishna's arm would be shown placed lovingly around Radha's shoulders, or Radha herself would be portrayed hiding her head on Krishna's breast.[114] In all these pictures, the style had an innocent and exquisite clarity, suggesting by its simple unaffected naturalism the artists' delight in Krishna's character, their appreciation of the feminine mind, their sense of s.e.x as inherently n.o.ble and their a.s.sociation of romance with G.o.d himself.

It is in a series of ill.u.s.trations to certain texts, however, that Kangra painting reaches its greatest heights. Among the many artists employed by Sansar Chand, a certain Purkhu was notable for his 'remarkable clearness of tone and delicacy of handling,'[115] and though none of his pictures are signed it is these qualities which characterize one of the two most famous sets of ill.u.s.trations executed in Kangra. The subject was the tenth book of the _Bhagavata Purana_ and the scenes ill.u.s.trated ranged from Krishna's birth and adventures with demons to his frolics with the cowgirls and final slaughter of Kansa. Purkhu's style--if Purkhu is indeed the master responsible--is remarkable for its luminous clarity, its faint suggestions of modelling, and above all for its natural use of rhythm. In every scene,[116] cowherds appear engaged in different tasks, yet throughout there is a sense of oneness with Krishna himself. Krishna is shown delighting all by his simple friendliness and dignified charm and the style itself endows each scene with gentle harmony.

Purkhu was clearly one of the greatest artists ever to practise in the Punjab Hills, but it is a certain Kushala who is supposed to have been Sansar Chand's special favourite. We do not know which pictures are by his hand but there exist two series of ill.u.s.trations of such distinctive quality that Kushala may well have been responsible.[117] One is a series of paintings ill.u.s.trating part of Bihari's _Sat Sai_--the seven-hundred poems in which he extolled Krishna's love-making.[118] The other is yet another version of the _Gita Govinda_ where Krishna is shown consorting with the cowgirls in blissful abandon.[119] In both these series, the inherent loveliness of Radha and the cowgirls is expressed by supple flowing line, a flair for natural posture and the inclusion of poetic images. The scarlet of a cowgirl's skirt is echoed by the redness of a gathering storm, the insertion of Krishna into the background suggesting the pa.s.sionate nature of their imminent embraces.[120] In a similar way, the forest itself is 'threaded with phases of pa.s.sion' and slender trees in flower parallel the slim romantic girls who long for Krishna's love.

One other Kangra master remains to be mentioned. Besides the pictures already noted, there exists a further series ill.u.s.trating the tenth book of the _Bhagavata Purana_. The artist's ident.i.ty is once again uncertain, but just as the Garhwal master was fascinated by the swirl of curling water, the Kangra artist in question delighted in the blonde pallor of the Indian moon.[121] Each incident in the text is rendered as if in moonlight--a full moon riding in the sky, its pale reflection s.h.i.+ning in water, the countryside itself bathed throughout in frosty whiteness. As a result the figures of Radha and the cowgirls seem imbued with pallid glamour, their love for Krishna with an almost unearthly radiance.

Kangra painting continued throughout the nineteenth century but it was only during Sansar Chand's own reign (1775-1823) that the style achieved great lyrical glory. Similarly it was only towards the end of the eighteenth century that other states in the Punjab Hills developed their own interpretations of the great impa.s.sioned theme. At Nurpur, Chamba, Kulu and Bilaspur[122] pictures of Krishna had temporary vogues and at all these places artists created new modes of expression. None of the local styles, however, possessed the same prestige as that of Kangra and all were subsequently obliterated by the general Kangra manner. By the mid-nineteenth century, the Rajput order in the Punjab Hills foundered before the British and while lesser n.o.bles and merchants continued to purchase pictures of Krishna the cult as a whole declined in princely favour. Only in Eastern India and then mainly in the villages did delight in Krishna continue to evoke new painting. From the twelfth century onwards Bengal had constantly celebrated the loves of Krishna--the poets Jayadeva, Chandi Das and Vidyapati being all natives of this part of India. Hymns to Krishna were sung in the villages and as part of this fervid adhesion, local ma.n.u.scripts of the _Bhagavata Purana_ and the _Gita Govinda_ were often produced. Such ma.n.u.scripts were normally not ill.u.s.trated but were preserved between wooden covers, on which scenes of Krishna dancing with the cowgirls or with male devotees were painted.[123]

Book covers of this kind were produced in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and the resulting pictures have something of the savage elation a.s.sociated with the Basohli style and its derivatives. During the nineteenth century, painted book-covers ceased to be produced but three other kinds of painting continued to celebrate the Krishna theme. Frescoes of Hindu G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses including Krishna were often executed on the mud walls of village houses in Mithila, the birthplace of the poet Vidyapati, and the style of painting with its brilliant colours and brusque distortions testified to the great excitement still engendered by Krishna's name.[124] At Kalighat near Calcutta, a special type of water-colour picture was ma.s.s-produced for sale to pilgrims and although the stock subjects included almost every Hindu G.o.d, many incidents from Krishna's life were boldly portrayed.[125] The style with its curving sumptuous forms is more a clue to general Bengali interests than to any special att.i.tudes to Krishna, but the pictures, strangely parallel in style to the work of the modern artist Fernand Leger, have a robust gaiety and bounding vigour, not inappropriate to the Krishna theme. The third type of painting is the work of professional village minstrels known as _jadupatuas_. As a means of livelihood, _jadupatuas_ travel from village to village in West Bengal, entertaining the people by singing ballads and ill.u.s.trating their songs with long painted scrolls. As each ballad proceeds, the scroll is slowly unwound, one scene leading to another until the whole is concluded. Among the ballads thus intoned, the romance of Krishna is among the most common and the style of painting with its crude exuberance suggests the strength of popular devotion.[126]

There remains one last form of painting. During the twentieth century, the modern movement in Indian art has produced at least four major artists--Rabindranath Tagore, Amrita Sher-Gil, Jamini Roy and George Keyt.

Of these four, the first two did not ill.u.s.trate the Krishna theme. Jamini Roy, on the other hand, has often painted Krishna as flute-player and dancer.[127] It would be unrealistic to suggest that these pictures spring from a lively sense of Krishna as G.o.d--Jamini Roy has, in fact, resorted to themes of Christ with equal, if not greater, frequency but has shown no signs of becoming a Christian. It is rather that in painting these pictures, he has treated Krishna as a symbol of rural vitality, a figure whose boisterous career among the cowherds is an exact reflection of his own att.i.tudes and enthusiasms. To Jamini Roy, the Bengali village with its sense of rude health is infinitely to be preferred to a city such as Calcutta with its artificiality and disease and in a style of bold simplifications, he has constantly celebrated the natural vigour and inherent dignity of simple unsophisticated men.

Such pictures stress a comparatively unimportant side of Krishna's character and it is rather in the paintings of George Keyt that Krishna the lover is proudly portrayed. Born in Ceylon of mixed ancestry, Keyt has, for many years, been acutely responsive to Indian poetry. In 1947, he published the translation of the _Gita Govinda,_ excerpts from which have been quoted in the text, and throughout his career his work has been distinguished by a poet's delight in feminine form and sensuous rapture.

To Keyt such a delight is a vital component of adult minds and in the romance of Radha and Krishna he found a subject subtly expressive of his own most intimate beliefs. His paintings and line-drawings of Radha, Krishna and the cowgirls--at once modern yet vitally Indian in spirit--have the same qualities as those in the _Gita Govinda_.[128] Radha and Krishna are shown luxuriating in each other's elegance, a certain ineffable tenderness characterizing their gestures and movements. Their love is gentle rather than brusque, an air of glamorous wonder broods above them and we meet once more that blend of romantic sensuality and loving innocence which is perhaps the chief Indian contribution to cultured living. It is this quality which gives to Indian paintings of Krishna and his loves their incomparable fervour, and makes them enduring expressions of Indian religion.

[Footnote 66: Plates 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13-17, 21 and 36.]

[Footnote 67: M.R. Mazumdar, 'The Gujarati School of Painting,' _Journal of the Indian Society of Oriental Art_, 1942, Vol. X, plates 3 and 4.]

[Footnote 68: Collection Maharaja of Jaipur, Pothikhana, Jaipur.]

[Footnote 69: Collection Maharaja of Jodhpur, Pustakaprakash, Jodhpur Fort.]

[Footnote 70: Plate 22. Collection N.C. Mehta, Bombay. For reproductions of 2 and 3, see Karl Khandalavala, 'Leaves from Rajasthan,' _Marg_, Vol. IV, No. 3. Figs. 8 and 10.]

[Footnote 71: Moti Chandra, _Jain Miniature Paintings from Western India_ (Ahmedabad, 1949), Figs. 99-105.]

[Footnote 72: Khandalavala, op. cit., Fig. 14; _The Art of India and Pakistan_, Pls. 81 and 82.]

[Footnote 73: Plates 23 and 24.]

[Footnote 74: For reproductions, see E. Wellesz, _Akbar's Religious Thought reflected in Mogul Painting_ (London, 1952), Pls. 1-37.]

[Footnote 75: Reproduced Hendley, _Memorials, The Razm Namah_; see also Plates 1 and 2 below.]

[Footnote 76: _The Art of India and Pakistan_, Plate 88.]

[Footnote 77: H. Goetz, _The Art and Architecture of Bikaner State_ (Oxford, 1950), Fig. 91.]

[Footnote 78: Coomaraswamy, _Boston Catalogue, VI, Mughal Painting_, Plates 8-19.]

[Footnote 79: Goetz, op. cit., Figs. 78 and 93.]

[Footnote 80: Plate 29. See also B. Gray, _Treasures of Indian Miniatures from the Bikaner Palace Collection_ (Oxford, 1951), Plate 6.]

[Footnote 81: Plates 28 and 32. See also Archer, _Indian Painting_, Plate 7.]

[Footnote 82: _The Art of India and Pakistan_, Plate 85.]

[Footnote 83: Plate 32.]

[Footnote 84: Plate 34.]

[Footnote 85: Plate 33.]

[Footnote 86: Bharat Kala Bhawan, Banaras.]

[Footnote 87: Eric d.i.c.kinson, 'The Way of Pleasure: the Kishangarh Paintings', 2 _Marg_, Vol. III, No. 4, 29-35.]

[Footnote 88: Ibid., 31.]

[Footnote 89: Plate 39.]

[Footnote 90: For cartoons of this picture, see A.K. Coomaraswamy, _Indian Drawings_ (London, 1912), Vol. II, Plate 2 and _Rajput Painting_, Vol. II, Plates 9 and 10.]

[Footnote 91: Note 22.]

[Footnote 92: Gangoly, _Masterpieces of Rajput Painting_, Plate 10.]

[Footnote 93: Plates 4, 10, 26, 27, 30 and 31. _The Art of India and Pakistan_, Plates 100-102.]

[Footnote 94: Plate 4.]

[Footnote 95: Plate 10.]

[Footnote 96: Archer, _Indian Painting in the Punjab Hills_, Fig. 6.]