• This forum contains old posts that have been closed. New threads and replies may not be made here. Please navigate to the relevant forum to create a new thread or post a reply.
  • Welcome to Tamil Brahmins forums.

    You are currently viewing our boards as a guest which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our Free Brahmin Community you will have access to post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free so please, join our community today!

    If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact contact us.

Meet the man who is digitally conserving and restoring the Ajanta caves

Status
Not open for further replies.

prasad1

Active member
Arif Khan and his wife Nazia had planned their visit to the Ajanta Caves – their first Valentine’s Day outing after their wedding in November – meticulously. They started early from their hometown, Aurangabad, 107 km from the caves, because the “history buffs” wanted to spend as much time as possible at the Unesco World Heritage site. A day before their outing, Nazia bought an old fashioned guidebook to understand the complex narratives behind Ajanta’s fabulous 2,000-year-old murals and sculptures, which depict the lives and times of Buddha and Bodhisattvas (the principal figure in the Jataka tales, which narrate the previous lives of Buddha).

“We were excited because many things about Ajanta are still a mystery: who built and funded the construction of the rock-cut caves, and the paintings, and why did the inhabitants suddenly leave the site?” said Nazia, 28, a primary school teacher, as she stood in a queue outside cave number 7. “But I am disappointed because we could not see the murals properly… it is so dark inside the caves.” Arif, 32, also a teacher, added with a disarming smile: “No clear photos for Facebook either. But how did the artists do these incredible paintings in this near-pitch darkness”?


That question has intrigued many including Nashik-based artist-photographer Prasad Pawar, who has been researching, documenting, photographing and digitally restoring the Buddhist paintings and sculptures in Ajanta for 27 years, but without touching them. “It is indeed a mystery how monks and artists produced such array of work with minimum light. Take for example, cave number 1 (80x80ftx12ft). It has only one door (1x2 metres) and two windows (1x1 metre). Yet the walls and ceilings have beautiful murals, and carvings on the pillars,” said Pawar, a slim, tall man with shoulder-length salt and pepper hair. “The artists couldn’t have used mashaals because they would suck the oxygen out of the room, making it difficult to work, and also leave carbon deposits on the artwork”.


It’s not just the semi-darkness inside the caves that challenges visitors such as Nazia and Arif at Ajanta, a horseshoe-shaped site, overlooking a narrow sinuous gorge and a hilly rivulet called Waghora. There are other restrictions imposed by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), which manages the site, to ensure that these fragile murals and statues are not damaged: No camera flash or harsh light (there are soft LED lights inside the caves since stronger ones can destroy the skin of the murals); limited viewing time (10 minutes) and barriers at 8-10 feet in front the murals and Buddha statues to prevent viewers from touching the artwork. The paintings are in a fragile state, with missing portions, thanks to their antiquity, water seepage (98 per cent of the cracks in the caves have now been sealed by ASI), missteps in earlier conservation-restoration practices that began from the British era, vandalism and robbery.

https://www.hindustantimes.com/indi...janta-caves/story-EAcBOYWqnCAkKZ53Y5O6lK.html




Everyone should visit AJanta and Ellora caves.
 
[FONT=&quot]AJANTA
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]A mystery for photographers
Many have tried to capture the beauty of Ajanta’s paintings. Major Robert Gill was appointed by the East India Company to produce facsimile copies of all paintings in 1844. In 1866, the copies were sent to London for an exhibition. But a major fire destroyed 20 years of work. In 1872, Sir John Griffiths, principal of JJ School of Arts, Mumbai, was entrusted with the work. But his paintings too were gutted in a fire at an exhibition in London.
[/FONT]

[FONT=&quot]A rich legacy
The paintings and sculptures were crafted by unknown Buddhist monks and artists between the second century BC and sixth century AD. The site has 29 caves (including the unfinished ones) of which four are finished chaitya halls (prayer halls) and one unfinished whereas rest are viharas (monastries) as well as chaitya-vihara combine. The paintings are also a snapshot of the history of those times: court and street scenes, domestic life and flora and fauna and the global trade links. The murals could be grouped into three distinct categories: images of Buddha, Boddhisatvas, narratives of life of Buddha, Jatakas, and Avadanas, ceiling decoration and decorative motifs. "These paintings and sculptures provided the greatest inspiration in the art revival of the 20th century, as they had influenced many centuries earlier, the art tradition not only of contemporary India but also of central Asia," wrote ASI’s first woman director Debala Mitra in ‘Ajanta’.
[/FONT]
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Latest ads

Back
Top