Asian Art Blog

Krishna playing the flute

Above we see a brass statue of a dancing Lord Krishna. Krishna is an avatar of Vishnu, the Hindu God of sustenance. The scriptures give the exact astronomy of his moment of birth, which maps to the 19th of July 3228 BC. His life is documented in detail in numerous scriptures like Puranas and great epics like the Mahabharata.

During his life Krishna lived as both a simple cowherd and a king. Moreover, he fought wars, married, got kids, danced and inspired many on his way with wise words and a smile in all possible circumstances. The dynamic pose of this sculpture demonstrates these multiple facets of his life. 

Two of his hands were holding a flute and in the other two hands we see two other attributes of Vishnu: the disk and a conch. This statue dates back from 1500-1700 and was made in Odisha (North East india).

In this time period Krishna devotion was re-introduced by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (1486–1534). He inspired many to sing devotional songs (Kirtans), chant specific mantras and study the teachings of the life of Krishna. Brass statues like this are very common on private altars, which were also inspired by this movement.

Much later, in the previous century, another teacher brought this movement to the Western world. Since then, followers of this so-called "Krishna Consciousness Movement" are found around the globe. They are very well known to go dancing and singing through the streets of large European and Northern American cities.

Shiva Nataraj: The dancing Shiva

This is in fact the largest massive bronze Shiva statue in the world! With 1,53 cm in height and in its entirety almost 300kg in weight, it is an impressive expression of Asian Bronze divinity.

There are larger statues of Shiva but none of these are made out of massive bronze. It is identified to be made in the Chola empire (Tamil Nadu: South India) from between 1100 - 1200, but the artist remains unknown. Research has shown that this statue was buried under ground soon after it was created. After being found, it entered the art market instead of a Temple for which it was intended originally.