Large Size The Lotus Seated Goddess Lakshmi

Large Size The Lotus Seated Goddess Lakshmi
Specifications:

South Indian Temple Wood Carving

35 inch X 17.5 inch X 6.5

19 kg

Highly symbolic and sensitively treated this wood-statue, acharacteristic example of South Indian temple wood-carving, renderedwith fine details and painted brilliantly discovering not merely theaesthetic beauty of the image but also its inherent dimensions,represents the four-armed goddess Lakshmi in her most accomplishedmanifestation covering the growth of her cult right since Vedic days.The divine dimensions of goddess Lakshmi as one who bestows abundance,plenty of food, progeny… are identified in the Rig-Veda itself, thehead-source of entire scriptural knowledge. The subsequentAtharva-Veda further widens the divine aura of the goddess as theuniversal mother with large breasts full of abundant milk, theinexhaustible source of life. Hence, ever since Lakshmi has beenperceived in scriptures and visual art forms as the goddessmanifesting riches, prosperity, accomplishment and sustenance, and herform, essentially as large-breasted, as representing supreme beauty,absolute womanhood and timeless motherhood, the source of endlesslife.In many of its verses the Rig-Veda lauded the earth for fertility andfor giving abundant food. Despite that she is not classed either asthe goddess or as the mother, or invoked as such, the text’s reverencefor the earth is very high. Fertility aspect and their power to bestowabundant food being common, the reverence for the earth seems to havesubsequently merged with the divine aura of Lakshmi. In subsequentdays after Lakshmi was being seen primarily as the goddessrepresenting riches, prosperity and abundance – as the goddess ofrich, prosperous and wealthy traders and elite, hardly ever reachingthe farmers’ fields, a separate divine form, consecrated as Annapurna,emerged for representing the food-giving divinity. An aspect ofLakshmi, Annapurna developed her own iconography and got a number ofshrines, especially in southern part of the country, dedicated to her.Delightfully, this image of goddess Lakshmi incorporates, besides herown cult as the Rig-Veda initiated, also the aspects that themother-earth and Annapurna manifest.Perfect in anatomy, modeling of figure conceived with large breastsabounding in rare beauty and absolute womanhood, the statue representsthe four-armed Lakshmi in adherence to her form as evolved in Vedicliterature, the Rig-Veda and the Atharva-Veda. Enshrining the lotusseat in her own right and with none of the Vaishnava attributesdefining her form she reveals the status of an independent divinity,not one of Lord Vishnu’s consort, as subsequently the Puranasattributed to her. As suggests the anatomy of her figure, especiallyher well developed breasts clad with red and green stana-pata –breast-band, red symbolising energy, green, fertility, and largebreasts, her power to feed and sustain, the artist has modeled hisfigure of the goddess to reveal ultimate motherhood. He has styled theapexes of the lotuses that she is holding in her upper hands likepots, the attributes of Annapurna, the food giving mother, who storedin her pots inexhaustible stocks of food. Further, he has preferredher image to enshrine a large lotus, and another, to support her foot.Both the lotus and the pot in Lakshmi’s iconography are denotative ofher dairy-agrarian links that she shared with the earth goddess.The statue represents the golden-hued goddess seated on a full blownmulti-petalled lotus in ‘lalitasana’ revealing ultimate beauty, raregrace and great majesty. Besides the larger lotus she is seated on,she has a tinier one, quite cute as it looks, as the foot-raise underher right foot suspending below. Consisting of five cosmic elements :earth, water, fire, air and space, the lotus represents the cosmos.While seated on it she pervades it and thus symbolically the cosmos,which she upholds and sustains, the essence of her being. Lotussymbolism further continues. In two of her upper hands she is carryinglotuses, while the normal right is held in ‘abhaya’ – assuring freedomfrom fear, and the normal left, in ‘varad’ – assuring accomplishmentof the desired. The upper hands are sometimes interpreted asconducting divine energy that the goddess inherently draws from unseenzones for accomplishing her divine act that her ‘abhaya’ and ‘varad’granting hands symbolise. In aesthetic merit, craftsmanship, modeling,plasticity, iconographic perfection, fluidity of figure, andsymmetrically balanced parts and anatomy, the statue is simplyoutstanding.This description by Prof. P.C. Jain and Dr Daljeet. Prof. Jain specializes on the aesthetics of ancient Indian literature. Dr Daljeet is the chief curator of the Visual Arts Gallery at the National Museum of India, New Delhi. They have both collaborated on numerous books on Indian art and culture.