Technical Analysis of Sculpture for Economic Studies of Past Societies
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TECHNICAL ANALYSIS OF SCULPTURE FOR ECONOMIC STUDIES OF PAST SOCIETIES Chandra L. Reedy Art Conservation Program, 19716, USA
303 Old College,
University of Delaware,
Newark,
DE
INTRODUCTION Art historical research related to Himalayan copper-based sculpture has concentrated on its religious, historical, and cultural context; questions of style, regional provenance, and chronology have also been important issues. The relationship of art production to economic considerations, and the relative role of economics versus aesthetics in the choice of casting and decorating alternatives, have received little attention. Although these are indeed difficult problems to address, they are nevertheless interesting ones that deserve some attempts at analysis. Prehistoric archaeologists, who tend to be relatively more concerned with economic aspects of material culture, have noted that choice in materials selection reflects a complex framework of economic (what is available and affordable to a person), social, and political criteria, as well an personal 1 preference (aesthetics) . When applying this idea to an analysis of reasons for regional variation in materials and technique selection in the production of sculpture in the medieval-period (5th-15th centuries) greater Himalayan area, we are faced with a complex set of possibilities. Thin paper is a beginning attempt at unravelling two of these. The hypotheses under consideration are: (1) Some regional variations in casting and decorating choices might be related to economic differences between regions, including differing access to the raw materials important for sculpture production; and (2) Some casting and decorating methods may be chosen primarily out of aesthetic preference (personal or of the society at large).
MATERIALS AND METHODS A regional comparison of selected casting and decorating techniques was performed for 298 Himalayan copper-based sculptures that can each be attributed to one of eight specific regions: Afghanistan, North Pakistan, Kashmir, and Himachal Pradesh (comprising Northwest India); Nepal; West Tibet, Central Tibet, and East Tibet. These attributions were established in a previous regional provenance study2,3. The specific techniques for comparison were chosen on the basis of the likelihood that they might be strongly related to raw materials access, making them potentially useful in unravelling economic/aesthetic interactions. Geological studies of the Himalayan area were used to generate a set of expectations regarding the regional distribution of various canting and decorating materials and techniques if choice were strictly controlled by economic parameters, primarily the ease of access to raw resources, rather than by aesthetic parameters. The actual distribution of techniques was then compared to this model. Variables included in this initial analysis are the presence of solid versus hollow castings, silver inlay work, and gilding. Information regarding the presence of a solid or a hollow casting was obtained for each sculpture through X-ray
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