Ridi Vihare: The Flowering of Kandyan Art

Description: Title: Ridi Vihare: The Flowering of KandyanArt By SinhaRaja Tammita – Delgoda Illustrator : Saroja Dharmadasa Publisher: Stamford Lake Pvt. Ltd Publication Date: 2006 Binding: Hardcover Book Condition: Very Good, book and dustjacket are as new with no marks, damage or notes/highlighting. Inscribed “to MrGeorge Hodges, my congratulations on your scholarship, with warm regards“Signed by one of the contributors (unsure which one*) Columbo April 29 2010. *This book was sent to him shortly before his death, when hewas no longer able to travel, it was the one of the last books he read. Ridi Vihare, or ‘TheSilver Vihare’, has its origin during the early days of Buddhism in Sri Lanka, Heir to a tradition which dates back to theearly Anuradhapura period, its beginnings are shrouded in myth and legend. Over the centuries the vihare has become averitable treasure trove of Sinhala art: oainting, architecture, sculpture,ivory carving and metalwork. This worktraces the art and history of the temple from the 2nd Century BCE to 1815 CE.’ The above is part of ageneral description on the inside of the dust cover of ‘Ridi Vihare: theflowering of Kandyan Art’ by SinhaRaja Tammita-Delgoda, a narrative decoratedby photographs from Studio Times, illustrations by Saroja Dharmadasa, and plansand drawings by Ineke Pitts and Kapila Ariyanada. It is apt, consideringthe moment of narration, the first years of the 21st Century, that the authorhas framed this history with an observation by Ananda Coomaraswamy: In the words of Blake, When nations grow old, TheArts grow cold, And commerce settles onevery tree. In such a grim fashion has commerce settled in the East. Indeed, we live in timeswhen commerce has captured tradition and much else besides, what withorgan-trade and the trading of polluting-rights. It has come to a point where all nations, oldand new, have commerce-laden trees. Ittook time with us, but we’ve learned fast, it seems. The intrinsic worth of anything, be itartifact of pageant, exorcism or ritual, giving (dana) or devotion, has givenway to commercial potential. King Marketrules, decides and dispenses. And so, we name andattach price-tag, forgetting often that certain things resist valuation andcategorization. Therefore we find thatvalue-attachment is reduced to the quantifiable and the play of demand andsupply. It is in this context that onehas is stopped-in-track by the amazing disclaimer: ‘No one who has worked onthis book has asked for or received payment of any kind; all royalties havebeen donated by the author to the Ridi Vihara’. That’s giving. Truly. As great a gift is thebook itself. It is a scholarly study ofa kind one does not associate with the dust, foreboding, pedantic and exclusivetypical of history books. Sure, throw ina lot of pictures and you get enough colour to drive out the dismal and turnout a page-turner. These are oftenbetter ‘histories’ than some texts which do not reach scholarly benchmarks interms of standards and sweep but stillsee mediocrity getting doctorate and professorship, one must acknowledge. They also tend to be less ideology-burdenedthan much of the ‘history’ that is churned out by quacks masquerading ashistorians. Even if all this weren’ttrue, as far as the ordinary (i.e. non-academic) reader is concerned, they arefar more readable narratives. ‘Ridi Vihare’ is not acollection of pictures with captions empowered by exceptional talent at turninga phrase, though. Here the illustrationsand photographs enhance rather than gloss over text, excuse poor scholarship orboost marketability, which is common in picture-history books. It is not just because the subject is bothhistory in general as well as the appreciation of art-evolution, whichnaturally make illustration-insertion sensible. Tammita-Delgoda’s exercise is more wholesome and appreciative of a rangeof influencing strands that saw the Ridi Vihare move from what it was to whatit is. It is the historian inhim that locates Ridi Vihare in historical context, across the centuries, aswell as in the fascinating narrative of temple art, in particular the rock andcave wall painting that our ancients have so generously endowed over thecenturies. It is the embeddedness of anauthor in his society and as part product of transformations over time thatgives body to the narrative. Suchconscious ‘affinity’ would scar objective gaze over the subject, one mightargue, but then again it is also true that the neutral gazer is inescapablybound by his/her own locations and histories. There is always indulgence even though the indulgent might protestinnocence. What is perhaps the moresensible and all things considered, the more scientific, approach would be toresist both grip and discard, and seek ‘caress’ in the appreciation of what isbefore the scholar’s gaze. That would bea kind of Buddhist Historiography or let’s say ‘Buddhistic’historiography. ‘Ridi Vihare’ has thattender, touching-but-not-touching touch in narrative. Tammita-Delgoda offers acareful and exhaustive study of the ‘Ridi Vihare’ complex, i.e. the severalcaves as well as the structures built on two rocky hills, in the village ofRidigama in the Kurunegala District. The work introduces to us a comparatively poorly studied temple (of thehundreds of temples that warrant study, one might add) with an excellentforeword about Kandyan art and scholarship related to it. The archival research hasclearly been exhaustive. The author musthave spent countless hours pouring over all chronicles to seek out referencesand use these to trace the relevant history. He tells us multiple stories, some of the folk tradition included by theMahawamsa chronicler (who appears to have understood the legitimacy of folknarratives long before Gayatri Spivak and others coined the term ‘SubalternStudies’) as well as the hard-evidence stories. He gives name and date, details that are so important to those whobelieve history is a pure science and for others who, even though they are notas fixated, nevertheless like to know who did what and where. So we are taken from the2nd Century through the many upheavals after the European invaders set foothere to the time of the Kandyan kings. Woven in is the long and complex conflict between the Theravada andMahayana traditions of Buddhism, which although portrayed as a bitter politicalduel, nevertheless demonstrated contestations framed by an agreement to coexistand focus on ideological push and pull. The tenuous relations between king and Buddhist Order, or Sangha, issimilarly referenced to give a fuller picture on the historical canvass. The political ups anddown naturally left traces on all things, culture included. Temple renovation is then a part of thatstory. Patronage too inscribed signature. Tammita-Delgoda takes us along these sub-plots, interjecting tastefullyand appropriately the relevant ideological and philosophicalunderpinnings. ‘Ridi Vihare’ then, isnot just a description of some monastic or religious complex, but a window onthe political changes that took place, changes which are one way or anothermarked on the narrative of the site. From here he proceeds todissect. The chapter, appropriatelytitled ‘Anatomy of a Temple’, is largely descriptive. The attention to detail is noteworthy. Each key element of the complex has beensubject to a thorough examination and full documentation. It show not just an enumerators fascinationbut an art students natural tendency for comparison and contrast. Paintings have warrantedseparate explication, and fittingly too, considering their historical andartistic worth. Tammita-Delgoda, indelving into this element, tells us about that time and how the politics ofthat time impacted the fascinating and yet simple paintings which reflectedboth period as well as general philosophy-driven ways of the Sinhalapeople. He has brought in his deepunderstanding of Buddhist art as well as Buddhist philosophical tenets toenrich the narration of history. ‘Ridi Vihare’ isunique. It is not unrelated to the otherexamples of exceptional Buddhist art. This book points to the work that needs to be done to document theundocumented, mis-documented and the semi-documented. Tammita-Delgoda’s pains also indicate a newway of writing history, a manner that makes it accessible to the commonreader. There are, after all so manymore ‘vihares’ some made of silver, metaphorically speaking, and some not, butall replete with countless lines, curves and textures that help us rediscoverwho we are, where we came from and perhaps show us where we ought to go and howwe can get there. That ‘pointing’, so tospeak, deserves applause. But thenagain, the exercise and the excavator here, by proclamation, have said ‘thankyou, no’. That’s in line with beliefsystem embedded in the artifacts that were examined. Makes sense. [Published in the 'UNDO'Section of 'The Nation', September 9, 2012]

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