Background to Indian Art
Indian Art. Edited by Sir Richard Winstedt. (Faber and Faber. 7s. 6d.)
MANY of those who have written about the exhibition which recently opened at Burlington House have been at pains to point out that they know very little of Indian art, and have used this as an excuse for not tackling the real task of the critic—the assessment of the painting and sculpture as works of art. This attitude seems incom- prehensible. It is certainly regrettable. It is incomprehensible because any critic, professional or not, whose eyes have acquired a little sophistication in the art of seeing, could hardly find anything unfamiliar in the Indian idiom. It is regrettable because the general public may get the impression that Indian art is not to be under- stood by the average European without a tremendous effort of sympathy. A sympathetic study of Indian life and society, philo- sophy and religion, has great value. But it is not necessary for the appreciation of die paintings and sculpture in the galleries of
Burlington House. Their appeal is straightforward and requires no special adjustment. Anyone who likes European mediaeval sculp- ture will enjoy Indian sculpture. It is as easy to derive pleasure from the paifitings of Gujarat and Western India as from the Winchester Bible or from the schools of Kangra and Chamba as from the school of Siena.
This is not to say that many visitors to Burlington House, having assured themselves of the loveliness and appeal of the works there, will not wish 59 fit them into some sort of chronological pattern, to know something more of the men who made them and of the condi- tions under which they worked. It is for this sort of reader that this book has been written. It does not deal with aesthetics or art criticism, but attempts merely to sketch the historical and economic background to Indian art, with special reference to the organisation of the craftsman, his relations with his patron and the use to which the products of his skill were put. The summary of Indian history from the Indus civilisation of the third millennium B.C. up to the present day, by Professor H. G. Rawlinson, is comprehensive and useful. John' Irwin discusses the development of sculpture from the interesting small figures found at Mohenjo-daro and Harappa to the thirteenth-century schools of Mughal and Orissa. J. V. S. Wilkinson writes gracefully of Mughal and Bijapuri paintings and of the Rajput schools of the Hills and Plain. K. de B. Codrington gives a sympathetic account of Indian minor arts. It would be unfair perhaps in these days of austerity to complain of the illustra- tions, most of which had unfortunately to be drawn from English collections. But a map would have been useful. Altogether, a
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