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Ajantā Frescoes Author(s): Robert Ross Source: The Burlington Magazine for Connoisseurs, Vol. 29, No. 160 (Jul., 1916), pp.

154-155+158-161Published by: The Burlington Magazine Publications Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/860247Accessed: 28-03-2015 09:34 UTC

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Page 2: Ajanta Frescos

An Italian Lacquered Table of the 17th Century The pattern is without relief and all the details

are carried out with the utmost delicacy of touch. The whole production differs both in workmanship as well as in design from the usual European lacquerwork, above-mentioned, which is usually coarse in execution and in which figures, buildings and landscapes almost invariably occur. The work presents, at first sight, a somewhat Persian or Arab appearance. This is due to a certain similarity which the bands of gilt scrollwork bear to the gilt arabesques on a black or coloured ground found on painted caskets and other small objects made in Venice during the I6th century. Closer inspection, however, reveals the fact that the source of inspiration of the whole is none other than Chinese. Yet the model for the design must not necessarily be sought for among objects in oriental lacquer; but it is more probable that painted or woven silks, wall-papers and books of designs which were then becoming popular fur- nished the models.

Some admirable specimens of Chinese wall- paper in a house at Wottonunderedge, in Gloucestershire, are described by Mr. A. G. B. Russell in the 7th volume of The Burlington Magazine (p. 309). A comparison of the table- top with the illustrations which accompany Mr. Russell's article reveals the same trees and flowering shrubs, the same pheasants, cranes and richly plumaged birds, and the same ducks, hares

and other animals. Though the Chinese details have been here to a certain extent Europeanized, they retain their oriental character, and very con- siderable skill has been displayed in adapting them to suit the decorative scheme of the table. Wall- papers similar to that at Wottonunderedge were carried by the Dutch and English merchantmen to Amsterdam and London, and thence imported to central Europe and particularly to Italy, where they doubtless served as models for the lacquer artist who was responsible for the decoration of the table. It is probable that the date of its execution is about the last quarter of the 17th century.

Mr. Kendrick has drawn my attention to the very interesting likeness between certain details of the lacquered design and the fine English chinoiserie tapestry by John Vanderbank which was acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1910.1 This panel was woven at Soho during the last years of the 17th or the early part of the I8th century. It is therefore about the same date as the table, and exhibits many of the same features. The most remarkable of these are the scroll-work borders, which are of striking similarity to the delicate bands that play so prominent a part in the ornamental design of the table.

1 Victoria and Albert Museum Portfolios, Tapestries, Part I,

No. 5. Catalogue of Tapestries in the Victoria and Albert

Museum, p. 23, No. 5.

AJANTA FRESCOES* BY ROBERT ROSS

HE letterpress of art publications is proverbially dull, even when important or essential. The India Society, how- ever, has falsified an old calumny in which there was much terrible truth.

With superb reproductions (due to the skill of Mr. Emery Walker and the Oxford University Press) here is issued a libretto hardly less interest- ing than the copies of the Ajanta frescoes executed by Lady Herringham and her talented assistants. Such excellent reading is rare at all times, and some of us will regret there is not more of it. For those unfamiliar with Buddhist mythology, concise little versions of the Jatakas, or nativity stories, identified as being illustrated in the Ajantft caves, will be especially welcomed. A generous note by the editor emphasizes how much is owed to the liberality and patience of

predecessors whose copies were destroyed by fire in 1866 and 1885--a sequence of ill luck recalling that which pursued the former owners of a mummy at the British Museum. Sir Wilmot Herringham describes his brilliant wife's three visits to the caves between 19o6 and 1911. His description of a wonderful site is too fascinating not to quote :

These temples are hewn out of the solid hill which forms one side of a romantic valley thirty-four miles south of

Jalgaon, about 200 miles from Bombay on the line to Calcutta. . . . Between the columns of many of the

temples are hung great nests of bees, which must be care- fully humoured to prevent dangerous hostilities ; and in the deep recesses gibbering bats crawl sidling along the rock cornices unaware that the concentrated stench of their cen- turies of occupation is their formidable defence against man's intrusion. Standing on the terrace, you look down upon the river bed curving away to a waterfall on the right, and beyond it rises a sloping, rocky hill covered with scrub. In the rains the river becomes a mighty torrent, but in winter it dwindles to a stream with a few pools in it. Green parrots fly across it in the sunshine; monkeys, boars, and an occasional panther haunt it ; black buck feed in the valley. Everywhere on the banks are long bottle- shaped birds' nests something like those of our long-tailed tit. It is a wild and beautiful place.

A place one would certainly like to see, as Pater said of another shrine.

From Lady Herringham, the accomplished painter and copyist, an expert in all primitive

* Ajanta Frescoes, being reproductions in colour and mono- chrome of frescoes in some of the caves at Ajanta after copies taken in the years 1909-1911, by Lady Herringham and her assistants ; with introductory essays by various members of the India Society. Imnperial 4to (15 by II inches), ed. limited to 60o copies, of which 350 only are for sale at Four Guineas net each. The portfolio comprises 15 plates in colour, 27 in mono- chrome, I in collotype, and 28 pages of introductory matter.

Humphrey Milford (Oxford University Press).

I54

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Page 3: Ajanta Frescos

(A) " THE QUEISTIONS OF SARIPUTRA ", CAVE XVII, WALL OF ANTECHAMBER, LEFT CORNER. FROM A WVATER-COLOUR DRA\VIN(G BY SYAD) AHMAD

AJANTA FRESCOES ", PL. XXII (24)

AJANTA FIRESCOES PLATE I

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(B) MATRIPOSHAKA JATAKA; THE ELEPHANT RETURNS TO HIS MOTHER AND KINDRED IN THE JUNGLE.

CAVE XVII. FROM A COPY IN TEMPERA BY LADY HERRINGHAM. "4AJANTA FRESCOES ", PL. XXI (23) (C) DETAIL OF " THE BODHISATTVA AVALOKITESVARA, OR GREAT BUDDHA." BACK WALL OF HALL, LEFT OF ANTECHAMBER. FROM A XVATER-COLOUR COPY BY SYAD AHMAD AND MUHAMMAD FAZL UD

DI)IN. AJANTA FRESCOES ", PL. XXXII (35)

AJANTA FRESCOES

PLATE II

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Ajantd Frescoes mediums, we have valuable though rather sketchy observations on the history and character of the Ajanta frescoes. Influenced too perhaps by Pater, she shocks advanced archaeology by advocat- ing repairs, for copies at least, of the mutilated antique. Where predecessors have shown blemishes "we have thought it advisable for the sake of the beauty of the composition and of intelligibility to fill up the smaller holes." Without any claim myself to be an archaeologist, I think this was an entire mistake, though it is eloquently defended by Mr. Rothenstein. The value of the copies is sacrificed to the undoubted charm of the colour reproductions. I believe archaeologists would support my conten- tion. Very important is the impression recorded by Lady Herringham that the Ajanta walls--

were not so much surfaces to be decorated as spaces on which legends might be depicted for the identification of the devout.

If this statement is correct, as one feels sure it is, let us hope that late 19th-century nonsense about pure or mere decoration (based on a French mis- interpretation of Japanese art) is finally disposed of. The dates of the frescoes range, Lady Herringham tells us, from 450 to 650 A.D. It is a trifle disap- pointing to find that no special dates are hazarded in the table of plates for the paintings reproduced. Reference is merely given to a volume of Mr. Vincent Smith. We learn there are twenty dif- ferent kinds of painting ; but, alas, we are afforded no word on a subject which is Lady Herringham's own-that of the mediums employed in the original. Nor does Mr. Rothenstein, artist and art critic, tell us anything of the technique. One hesitates to differ from so learned an authority as Lady Herringham, who practised the recipes of Cennino Cennini long before visiting Ajantt, but her assertion "the drawing is on the whole like mediceval drawing" appears to me quite unsup- ported by the copies. Sometimes it resembles I7th and 18th-century Indo-Persian work; at others Russian eikon-painting of the late 17th and early I8th century, where an earlier tradition is affected or copied, rather than employed from real conviction. Sometimes there is an un- doubted resemblance to Gauguin, but a Gauguin not unconscious of an academic tradition left behind. And there is not a little which recalls G6r6me. All wall-painting not executed in oil or spirit varnish is apt to appear mediaeval in a super- ficial way. Even Tiepolo's frescoes at Villa Valmarna possess a severity unassociated with his genius. So, too, modern wall-painting, whether good or bad, may seem to future generations older than contemporary works on canvas. The most alert eye and brain are often tricked in contem- plating newly revealed antiquity.

Miss Larcher, one of the skilled assistants con- tributes an all too brief note on the method of taking the copies. She hints at a disappointment which the frescoes produce on the visitor-a dis-

appointment which Mr. Binyon seems to have experienced when he saw these copies. His attitude is implied with poetic delicacy when he says that the frescoes "appear more allied to western than eastern art". Those who know his predilection for oriental art will hardly be deceived by his in- vocation of Giotto and the Lorenzetti, or his grace- ful retirement from the discussion in favour of Mr. Rothenstein, "who has seen Ajanta with his own eyes-the eyes of an artist ". Not here, O Apollo, is what he seems to be saying to himself. The eyes, or at least the spectacles, are those, not merely of an artist but a keen politician, a critic and propagandist who wields tongue and pen with as much skill as pencil or brush. Tolstoi's story of the two old men who went on a pilgrimage to the Holy Sepulchre is irresistibly recalled. Mr. Rothenstein's vigorous little sermon from the fount might have been delivered without going to Ajanta at all. Its subject is the attitude of modern patrons to modern art, and the approach of certain contemporary painters to the visible world. At Ajanta he finds the precedent embalming the principle.

Neglecting the rich treasures we could still obtain from living craftsmen, we have during the last generation ran- sacked the world for examples of the art of the past, . In spite of the ruinous condition of the wall-paintings we must account it good fortune that the small interest hitherto felt in Indian fine art, as well as the great difficulty of the undertaking, has happily prevented the attempt to carry any of these paintings from the walls.

The prospect of Indian old masters swelling the ranks of their European peers as further rivals to the modern painter is one to be deleted at once. The moral of Ajanta is for him plain. Representa- tive art is that which has been practised by saint and sage. Let the artist, he thinks, concern himself with the material things of life and the spiritual will follow as a matter of course. At Ajanta we find-

the artist unconsciously expressing that wise element in Hindu (sic) religion which insists on a man first living the life of a householder, providing for his children and per- forming the common social obligations before he can give himself up completely to his spiritual needs.

Mr. Rothenstein is making a plea for genre paint- ing though he may not intend it; he makes it wittily and prettily. The expert archaeologist must decide how far he is justified in finding at Ajanta illustration for his text. The subjects, we are reminded elsewhere, have in many instances never been identified. But on an important question of fact, irrelevant to aesthetics or painting, the legend of the Buddha whether historical or fabulous is the apotheosis of disdain for material things and neglect of domestic duties-a disdain which is the common denominator of Buddhism, Christianity, and Greek philosophy. When Mr. Rothenstein blithely observes-

It is this perfect combination of material and spiritual energy which marks the great periods of art. At other times the balance is lost and one or the other is insisted upon with too marked an emphasis,

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AJant Frescoes you are tempted to ask which periods he considers great. Whatever the import of Ajanta painting may be in the history of art it cannot be brought home to us by invoking mediaevalism. Judaism, Mahomedanism, and Protestantism may support the ethics and aesthetics of Mr. Rothenstein; not early or mediaeval Christianity. While every- one will sympathize with the modern artist clutching at any human and domestic element in the Ajantd paintings because rare in monu- mental and religious art, we cannot be too cautious about accepting the manifestation on its face value. Some Japanese Buddhists have, I think, a principle by which mysterious truths are presented "under obvious representation suitable for obtuse minds"; it is called h-3ben. An inno- cent gentleman cutting his toe-nails, for all the world like something at the New English Art Club by Mr. Augustus John, may represent an in- carnation of the Great Being; gustation of the Divine Immanence; or the mystic union of nameless gods.

The contribution of Mr. F. W. Thomas, if less amusing, has more weight and more information. It is an archaeologist, not an art critic, who speaks. From him we learn that the importance of Ajanta is, that here alone, excepting the caves at Bagh, in Maliva, are any considerable remains of fresco painting. He warns us that--

The reproductions in this volume must be regarded frankly as fragments having a higher value for the purpose of artistic appreciation than on the archaeological side. ... The painting in the caves has an exclusively religious signi- ficance. . . . Among the scenes we should distinguish first of all the traditional events in the earthly life of Gautama Buddha, the most important being the birth : the abandon- ment of home.

Mr. Thomas cannot help warning the reader again against accepting too implicitly the art criticism of even his distinguished collaborators.

Before we can judge of a particular Buddha . . . as a work of art we must, if we are to preclude self-deception, ascertain how much in him is typical, conventional or symbolical; how much is to be attributed to the living imagination of the artist. And the same applies . . to other figures and even the decorative forms when they have a symbolical value.

Mr. Thomas, like his namesake, is a doubting apostle. I have endeavoured as a reviewer to give an account of this delightful and sumptuous pub- lication. In all proper humility I may perhaps be allowed to record the impression which the reproductions leave on eyes unequipped by Mr. Binyon's experience and scholarship, and on a mind unhouseled like that of Mr. Rothenstein by an inspection of the originals at Ajanta. The copies appear to vary in merit, particularly those of the native assistants. It is easy, however, to pick out their work from that of Lady Herringham and Miss Larcher without reference to the table of plates. I may think some of the copies are possibly improvements on the originals, because

of Lady Herringham's admissions. On comparing Plate xxII, the work of Mr. Syad Ahmad, with the photograph of the same fresco reproduced as Plate XLII (56), the balance is greatly in favour of Mr. Syad Ahmad. The original must in any case be rather a tiresome piece of hieraticism. Then drawing and colouring in different caves attain different levels of excellence, due, no doubt, to difference of date and preservation. Plates xxI and xxvII illustrate the most charming of the Jatakas, and seem happily enough among the best of the frescoes. Veritable predecessors of Gauguin are revealed in Plates IX and xxxII; they are among the most beautiful, at least in reproduction. Strictly aesthetic appreciation being permitted, may I without undue temerity question whether enthusiasm of travellers has not exaggerated the Ajanta frescoes as works of art. Since Mr. Binyon invites us, let us compare these copies even with inferior reproductions of Giotto and Lorenzetti. How poor they seem i Carpaccio too is a much better illustrator than any of these Buddhist crafts- men. Or take the lovely fragments of Pisanello at Verona (in one of the Arundel Society prints), and the Ajanta frescoes will seem insignificant. Then how would they endure before some of the Japanese and Chinese primitive masterpieces? Mr. Binyon wisely saves them from the ordeal. Surrender and prostration to all oriental art, because fairly early in date, irrespective of any relative merit, are in any case errors of fashionable criticism. Europe has articulated in marble, fresco, canvas and masonry that which Asia has never attempted with any success whatever.

One further suggestion crosses my unlearned vision. Are the Ajanta frescoes really primitive, as Lady Herringham claims some of them to be ? In the reproductions I do not find much to support the theory; particularly considering the slow de- velopment and decay of all oriental schools. The domesticity so much admired by Mr. Rothenstein appears to be of a very sophisticated kind. The naturalism does not seem to me the discovery by the artist of a new facility, such as you get in true primitive art. Here are tired and sometimes unskilful hands, such as you find in Roman and Hellenistic work at Pompeii. Another striking feature at Ajanta is the sensual conception of the figure groups; the languid feministic treatment of both male and female figures, alien to all primitive art, whether oriental or western, even when frankly pornographic. At Ajanta we are nearer to Giulio Romano than the Lorenzetti. Where you think there is something primitive at first, you become persuaded that it is archaistic, not archaic. Take Plates xxxII and xxIr, for instance: Gauguin and Mabuse perhaps, but not Giotto or Gentile da Fabriano. I should like to know the opinion of Mr. Thomas on this point. He is significantly silent except when he says drily that the costume

I6o

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Page 7: Ajanta Frescos

PROFESSOR VENTURI ON QUATTROCENTO PAINTING BY TANCRED BORENIUS

HE publication of the fourth part of the seventh volume of Professor Ven- turi's " Storia dell' arte italiana " com- pletes the section of this monumental work which is devoted to 15th-century

painting. Of the magnitude of the task now carried out by Prof. Venturi a bare statement of dates and figures will suffice to convey a vivid impression : Part I, published in 1911, 832 pages, with 496 illustrations; part II, 1913, 858 pages, with 656 illustrations; part III, 1914, 1,175 pages, with 892 illustrations; and part Iv, 1915, I,i53 pages, with 817 illustrations. Part I having been briefly noticed in these columns by another re- viewer shortly after its publication,' it is proposed in the present article to review in its entirety Prof. Venturi's treatment of one of the most fascinating and important chapters in the whole history of art.

It will be well first to give a brief indication of the general disposition of the material in the present volume. Part I opens with a discussion of various personalities of the Florentine school of the early 15th century, notably Lorenzo Monaco, Fra Angelico, Masolino and Masaccio. Having then treated of the Italian representatives outside Florence of the great international late Gothic art movement, the author goes on to trace the development of Florentine painting as evinced in the works of the "scientific naturalists" of the first generation and of their contemporaries of different tendencies. Piero della Francesca, the Sienese school of the 15th century, and various Umbrian masters (Boccati, Alunno, Bonfigli, etc.) are then dealt with, and the concluding chapter is devoted to Florentine painting of the second half of the quattrocento, ending up with a consideration of the early work of Leonardo da Vinci. The principal theme treated in part II is the diffusion of the artistic principles of Piero della Francesca in Central Italy; one after the other, the author discusses the artists affected, directly or indirectly, by the example of Piero, in the Romagna (Melozzo, Palmezzano), in the Montefeltro (Bramante, Giovanni Santi and others), in Rome and Latium (Lorenzo da Viterbo, Antoniazzo Romano), in the region of Tuscany adjoining Umbria (Signorelli and Don Bartolomeo

della Gatta), and in Umbria itself (Perugino and his followers); the activity of the young Raphael is dealt with at the end. In part III the author proceeds to trace the history of North Italian painting, treating first of Padua as a centre of art and of Francesco Squarcione and his pupils. The life and work of Andrea Mantegna having been dealt with, Prof. Venturi treats of the numerous artists under his influence in Venetia and Lom- bardy, and goes on to discuss the Ferrarese school of the second half of the quattrocento and the various schools in the Emilia affected by the example of the Ferrarese masters; the concluding chapter is devoted to the early activity of Cor- reggio. Part IV opens with a discussion of the art of Antonello da Messina, which is followed by a general survey of the schools of Southern Italy, Sicily and Sardinia; and the author then proceeds to complete his account of North Italian quattro- cento painting, discussing the schools of Venice and Venetia, of Lombardy, Liguria and Piedmont.

The general character of Prof. Venturi's great work is now too well known to make it necessary for me to dwell on this point at any great length; as all students of Italian art can testify, every one of these volumes, immediately on its appearance, takes its place on the shelf of our most frequently consulted works of reference, becoming the con- stant companion of our studies and investigations. The rare completeness of the author's mastery of the artistic materials of his study-whether in Italy or elsewhere-to which the previous volumes have accustomed us, meets us too in that now under notice, and one receives from it perhaps an even more vivid impression than before of the author's grasp of the intricate geographical sub- divisions of his subject-matter, of the currents of influence and ties of affinity between the various regions of Italy--an aspect of the problem of Italian art history which it is perhaps possible only for an Italian to do full justice to. A very valuable feature of the book, now as before, is the bibliographical notes given at the beginning of the sections dealing with the various schools and artists, and showing a most remarkable com- mand of the literature on the subjects under discussion, notably of the countless little known local Italian publications --short monographs, "Nozze" brochures, or articles in the various "Atti", "Archivi " or "Bollettini ". To choose SSee The Burlington Magazine, Vol. XIX (1911); p. 110o sq.

L I61

Aj4antca Frescoes of the Buddha is copied from the Lateran Sophocles -surely singular among "incunabula " of primi- tives. When Macaulay's New Zealander comes to excavate the House of Lords and takes away, let us say, copies of Blucher meeting Wellington

and perhaps a precious fragment of Landseer's Monarch of the Glen, let us hope they may not deceive the Anzacs in regard to the conditions of painting as practised by Thames-side between 1616 A.D. and 1916 A.D.

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