Yet for all her power, Durga is tamed. But what of her other daughter, the fearsome Kali, so often shown with her necklace of skulls, who is pictured here in two vivid, lively sculptures and several prints trampling all over the body of her husband, Shiva? (Yes - the same Shiva - Indian gods, like the Greek, do get a bit incestuous, their relationships a bit complicated.)
Ah, but there's a reason for his position. Kali was born of Durga's anger during the battle with the demons, springing full-blown from her mother's blackened forehead. She ran trumpeting that emotion through the universe, out of control, until Shiva chose to lie down in her path. The realisation that she was trampling on "her lord", as the gallery display puts it, brought her to her senses. Once again, rightful female anger is tamed, domesticated, controlled.
After all that depressing goddess-taming, it is a nice change of pace to enter the calm of domestic life — of achievements of what is possible within its limits with a small but delightful collection of kanthas, embroidered quilts that paint a personal, lively picture of the lives of their female creators. Members of London's Bengali community helped curators interpret these, so Tasneem Khan from Essex explains, they "showed the things that were happening inside the woman's head - losing her husband in battle, her brothers not coming home, things like that. They could not express it so they expressed it through the kantha."
The central kantha here is a tale of an Indian century — British soldiers, trains, much travel and movement, interspersed with more traditional images of animals and gods. The work is lively, captivating — entirely deserving of the title of masterpiece.
Uniting the human and divine in the final part of the exhibition is the story of the goddess Manassa. The local Bengali deity only appears in the "mainstream" national Hindu story around 1400 AD, but a dramatic, Khujaraho-style carving here, dated to the 12th century, in which she displays her characteristic association of pots and snakes, shows she'd been around for far longer.
Article comments
1 - Q Bit
Natalie:
Thanks for the wonderful review. Here are some notes that you and the readers might find helpful.
1.flanked by her daughters Lakshmi and Saraswati and at the bottom (unusually enough), her sons, Ganesh and Kartik.
Lakshmi is the goddess of wealth.
Saraswati is the goddess of wisdom and learning.
Ganesh is the god of knowledge but for reasons unknown he's always a favorite of the business establishment.
Kartik is the war god and supposedly the most handsome of all gods.
2. The story goes that Chando is a merchant who stubbornly rejects the goddess, clinging to the worship of Shiva.
The name of the guy is Chand which means moon. People usually call him "Chand Saudagar" meaning " Chand- the merchant".
2 - Natalie Bennett
Thanks for the kind words. I've checked my notes and they definitely say Chando - but perhaps I was having a small hallucination.
I'll check in the Museum next time I'm in - perhaps the name is transliterated different from a different language or "translation" system - like Ganesh/Ganesha?
3 - Q Bit
Natalie:
I wouldn't be surprised if the Museum refers to him as "Chando". You are right when you say it's because "the name is transliterated different from a different language" (which is Bengali in this case).
But you can take my word on this and correct the museum folks - it should be Chand and not Chando ("Chando" doesn't exist in bengali). But I guess it doesn't make a big difference.
Ganesh is the correct one, but Ganesha is fine too--in South India it's Ganeshan :-)
4 - diana hartman
I am pleased to tell you this article is being featured in the Culture Focus today, September 18th.
Diana Hartman
Culture Editor
5 - Howard Dratch
Natalie: The exhibition sounds fascinating but I followed all the links and the BM only shows one image. The other links go to a great site on mythology (thanks) and one on Discovering Islamic Art with some architectural photos of mosques I would surely never see in person. However, is there more of the exhibition on-line?
6 - Natalie Bennett
Hi Howard. Sorry, there doesn't seem to be anything else online. I did post an admittedly not very good picture of the main display kantha. Unfortunately because of the glass and the nature of the lighting, getting any decent pictures was a challenge.