Gupta art
The Gupta period is generally regarded as a classic peak and golden age of North Indian art for all the major religious groups.
The period saw the emergence of the iconic carved stone deity in Hindu art, while the production of the Buddha-figure and Jain tirthankara figures continued to expand, the latter often on a very large scale.
[16][17][18][19] Unlike some other Indian dynasties before and after them, and with the exception of the imagery on their coins, the Gupta imperial family did not advertise their relationship to the art produced under them by inscriptions, let alone portraits that have survived.
Among the earliest is an inscribed pillar recording the installation of two Shiva Lingas in Mathura in 380 CE under Chandragupta II, Samudragupta's successor.
[23] Another rare example is a statue of a seated Bodhisattva in the Mathura style with dhoti and shawl on the left shoulder, coming from Bodh Gaya and dated to "year 64", presumably of the Gupta era, thought to be 384 CE.
[15] This type remained a rare occurrence, as in most of the later Gupta statues the Buddha would be shown with the samghati monastic robe covering both shoulders.
[27][28][29] The Gupta style of statuary, especially as seen in the Buddha images, is characterized by several formative traits: ornate halos with floral and gem motifs, clothes with thin diaphanous drapery, specific hair curls, meditative eyes, elongated earlobes, relatively thick lower lips, and often three lines across the neck.
Minor figures such as yakshi, which had been very prominent in preceding periods, are now smaller and less frequently represented, and the crowded scenes illustrating Jataka tales of the Buddha's previous lives are rare.
Buddhist, Hindu and Jain sculpture all show the same style,[38] and there is a "growing likeness of form" between figures from the different religions, which continued after the Gupta period.
[39] The detail of facial parts, hair, headgear, jewellery and the haloes behind figures are carved very precisely, giving a pleasing contrast with the emphasis on broad swelling masses in the body.
[40] Deities of all the religions are shown in a calm and majestic meditative style; "perhaps it is this all-pervading inwardness that accounts for the unequalled Gupta and post-Gupta ability to communicate higher spiritual states".
[1] Under the Guptas, Mathura remained primarily a center of Buddhist artistic activity and worship, but a few Hindu, especially Vaishnavite, sculptures started to appear.
The pink sandstone sculptures of Mathura evolved during the Gupta period to reach a very high fineness of execution and delicacy in the modeling, displaying calm and serenity.
[58] The "first dated sculptures in a fully-fledged early Gupta style" come from the rock-cut Udayagiri Caves and the surrounding area near Vidisha in Madhya Pradesh.
The most famous is the 7 x 4 metre relief of Vishnu in the form of the giant boar Varaha, raising the earth from the primordial waters, watched by rows of much smaller gods, sages and celestial beings.
One cave also has an extremely rare inscription relating a site to the Gupta court, recording the donation of a minister of Chandragupta II.
Eran in Madhya Pradesh has a "pillar" or large single column dated 484/5 by an inscription of Buddhagupta, the only standing Gupta example, with two Garuda figures at the top (illustrated below).
Still at the site is a huge and impressive boar on four legs, with no human characteristics, its body covered with rows of small figures representing the sages who clung to the hairs of Varaha to save themselves from the waters.
[66] There are also other minor centres of Gupta sculpture, particularly in the areas of Dasapura and Mandasor, where a huge eight-faced mukhalinga (probably early 6th-century) found in the river has been reinstalled in the Pashupatinath Temple, Mandsaur.
The later Ajanta style of sculpture is somewhat heavy, but sometimes "awe-inspiring" in the large seated shrine Buddhas, but other smaller figures are often very fine, as is the ornamental carving on columns and door-frames.
[68] When combined with the painted walls, the effect can be considered over-decorated, and lacking "motifs on a larger scale to serve as focal points".
[69] Unlike the series of caves side by side at Ajanta, the main interest at Elephanta is the largest cave, a huge Shiva temple, and above all the colossal triple-bust (trimurti) of Shiva, 18 feet (5.5 m) tall, which "because it is so amazingly skilfully placed in relation to the various external entrances ... receives exactly the amount of light necessary to make it look as if it is emerging from a black void, manifestation from the unmanifest".
[5] Some can still be seen in their original settings on the brick temple at Bhitargaon, where the large relief panels have almost worn away, but various heads and figures survive at higher levels.
[82] Survivals of decorated secular metalwork are very rare,[84] but a silver plate in the Cleveland Museum of Art shows a crowded festival scene in rather worn relief.
[85] There is also a highly decorated object in bronzed iron that is thought to be a weight for an architect's "plummet" or measuring line, now in the British Museum.
[86] The gold coinage of the Guptas, with its many types and infinite varieties and its inscriptions in Sanskrit, are regarded as the finest coins in a purely Indian style.
The gradual deterioration in design and execution of the gold coins and the disappearance of silver money, bear ample evidence to their curtailed territory.
Several fragments of murals preserved from the earlier caves (Caves 10 and 11) are effectively unique survivals of ancient painting in India from this period, and "show that by Sātavāhana times, if not earlier, the Indian painters had mastered an easy and fluent naturalistic style, dealing with large groups of people in a manner comparable to the reliefs of the Sāñcī toraņa crossbars".
Unlike much Indian mural painting, compositions are not laid out in horizontal bands like a frieze, but show large scenes spreading in all directions from a single figure or group at the centre.
[133] The paintings in cave 1, which according to Spink was commissioned by Harisena himself, concentrate on those Jataka tales which show previous lives of the Buddha as a king, rather than as a deer or elephant or other animal.
