.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
Shiva's throne is a skillful interweaving of nature's elements and his own attributes - the seat is a stylized rock or mountain from which a banyan tree emerges, the trunk and the bull providing the throne-back and the leafy branches creating a natural nimbus, all of which cleverly reinforce his identification as a forest-dwelling deity. Though Shiva is not holding his cobra in his hand, they appear in his headdress and also with Apasmarapurusa, the dwarf beneath his foot who personifies ignorance being trodden by knowledge.
Shiva is portrayed as the omniscient young master conveying supreme knowledge to much older listeners, represented by the bearded ascetics seated beside him at all four corners of the plinth; for a later example, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, see P. Pal, Indian Sculpture, vol. 2, 1988, cat. no. 139b, p. 264f.
Shiva is portrayed as the omniscient young master conveying supreme knowledge to much older listeners, represented by the bearded ascetics seated beside him at all four corners of the plinth; for a later example, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, see P. Pal, Indian Sculpture, vol. 2, 1988, cat. no. 139b, p. 264f.