Indian Marriage & Wedding Ceremonies. (ONLY ur BEST)
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In the Aga Khan Park, experience Javid a.k.a JAH’s The Mingling of the (two) Oceans inside the Reflecting Pools. The 10-piece installation features paintings on re-purposed corrugated steel, and explores Vedic and Sufi sacred geometries (e.g. chakras and muqarnas).
The Aga Khan Museum offers visitors a window into the artistic, intellectual, and scientific heritage of Muslim civilizations across the centuries from the Iberian Peninsula to China.
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Vedic Astrology refers to Indian or Hindu astrology, a system that originated in ancient India and which was documented by sages in the Vedic scriptures. Also known as "Jyotish"—the science of light—Vedic astrology deals with astral light patterns that are thought to determine our destiny.
The term “Vedic” is often used to express the idea that this astrology is a sacred science, which was revealed by the Rishis, the founders of Vedic wisdom, more than 5000 years ago and was handed down from generation to generation without any changes until the present day.
The difference between vedic & western lies in the fact that while Vedic astrology is based on the fixed zodiac concept, Western astrology uses the moving zodiac concept. ... Astronomical Differences between Western and Vedic Astrology. The basic difference between the two systems is that the Vedic zodiac is Sidereal and the Western is Tropical.
Yearly predictions based on Vedic astrology are more accurate and reliable than those based on Western astrology. Sage / Maharishi Bhrigu is the father of Jyotish (Vedic astrology).
According to Vedic spirituality practice, the four months of raining season is also known Caturmasya. In these months, generally it is believed that the people in India fast and perform austerity. They fast from certain food on different months that is usually between July and October (varies according to the Vedic calendar).
In the last month of Caturmasya, it is known as Karthik. There is a pastime in this month that Mother Yashoda binds her son, Damodara's (Krishna) waist and tied Him against the mortar between two trees. The picture depicts the apprehension of Damodara as Mother Yashoda managed to catch Him after a long long time of chasing around the courtyard for breaking the butter pots and feeding the butter to the monkeys.
Also in this month of Karthik, devotees of Krishna will offer lit up candles and offer to Damodara throughout the entire month.
Thank you for viewing. If you like please fav and leave a nice comment. Hope to see you here again. Have a wonderful day 😊
ISKCON London 🇬🇧
29th October, 2019
That's a rather old one 😊, new to macro photography I was really going for it at the time, pretty industrious. This was in autumn, in a cold shadowy trench, couldn't see shit through the viewfinder, just super dark (reversed lens = no aperture coupling, plus a bunch of extension tubes), and my DIY paper flash diffusor got soggy and limp really fast as well, tumbling all over the place (now, my latest versions have a proper rotating mount and a thin wire frame to prevent that, and also for shaping), but it looks like I made that up with motivation and patience, resulting in lots of photos (to weed through) and so the occasional nice frame happend. 📷
(Ad title: A simile used in Hindu / Buddhist philosophy to (amongst other concepts) illustrate co-dependant arising of phenomena; it's an infinitely large net of droplets, pearls or jewels, each recursively mirroring everything else, owned by the Vedic deva Indra.)
I see Flickr placed more 'ads', that also derange the overall site layout, like the side bar does. Niice.., still trying to harass people into getting Pro it seems.
Huh, is it possible that they got rid of the iStock block? (Not gonna pretend I actually look at this stuff.) To just not care or place value on the site appears to be the best strategy, ..unfortunately. When the wind blows, the trees bend.
Nikon D90 (APS-C crop sensor / DX)
Minolta MD ROKKOR 28mm f/2.8 prime
Tridax 49mm reverse mount for Nikon F
ISO200, reversed 28mm, f/8, 1/160sec
reproduction ratio: ~ 1 : 1, single shot
extension tubes, pop-up flash with DIY
medium size paper diffusor, handheld
Over 20-years old painting The time goes by Thanks for comment and fav,much appreciated! Have a lovely day!😊
In the Aga Khan Park, experience Javid a.k.a JAH’s The Mingling of the (two) Oceans inside the Reflecting Pools. The 10-piece installation features paintings on re-purposed corrugated steel, and explores Vedic and Sufi sacred geometries (e.g. chakras and muqarnas).
The Aga Khan Museum offers visitors a window into the artistic, intellectual, and scientific heritage of Muslim civilizations across the centuries from the Iberian Peninsula to China.
I brahmani dell'epoca vedica seguirono l'esempio di Prajapati, che aveva duellato a lungo con Morte., rivaleggiando con lei nei sacrifici - e stava per abbandonare la partita, sfibrato, inadeguato, quando gli balenò la SAMPAD, l'equivalenza numerica, geometria impressa sulla luce, e allora vide che la vasta dispersione di ciò che viveva, ma soprattutto moriva, poteva articolarsi in rapporti che non si deterioravano. Ciò che la mente vede, quando coglie un nesso, lo vede per sempre. La mente può rovinare, insieme con il corpo che la sostiene, ma il rapporto sussiste, indelebile. Creando un edificio fatto di connessioni credettero, come già il loro avo Prajapati, di avere sconfitto Morte. Si convinsero che il male è inesattezza. Così morirono più tranquilli.
(R.Calasso, da "KA")
In the Aga Khan Park, experience Javid a.k.a JAH’s The Mingling of the (two) Oceans inside the Reflecting Pools. The 10-piece installation features paintings on re-purposed corrugated steel, and explores Vedic and Sufi sacred geometries (e.g. chakras and muqarnas).
The Aga Khan Museum offers visitors a window into the artistic, intellectual, and scientific heritage of Muslim civilizations across the centuries from the Iberian Peninsula to China.
Its mission is to foster a greater understanding and appreciation of the contribution that Muslim civilizations have made to world heritage. Through education, research, and collaboration, the Museum will foster dialogue and promote cross-cultural understanding.
As a vibrant educational institution, the Museum encourages the full spectrum of public engagement with its diverse Permanent Collection of more than 1,000 objects and its changing roster of exhibitions and innovative programs — including music and dance performances, theatre, lectures, workshops, and film screenings.
The Aga Khan Museum has an international mandate. It enjoys strong ties with such institutions as the Musée du Louvre in Paris, the State Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, and the Museum of Islamic Art in Doha while remaining deeply committed to forging relationships with Canadian institutions and communities. Together, these global and local connections generate exciting opportunities to enhance scholarship, inspire temporary exhibitions, and produce public programs honouring the spirit of collaboration upon which the Museum is built. 4
Within the Great Tree
That is my Life
Sing two birds of note:
One flits around from branch to branch
Sometimes joyously intoxicated
Sometimes devastatingly morose
It seems to stretch with every sound
Towards that other Bird
Waiting there in the higher branches
The illuminated- immovable One
That lives in a dimension beyond
The world of the five senses
Singing with such sweetness
Such profoundness
Bringing forth the essence
Of all that is possible
In the Universe of Music
This mysterious Songbird
Enraptures the aching one
Exudes an invitation
To experience more than the tree
As if every note
Contained the essence of Eternity
The immortal seed of Creation
The ecstasy of abundant Peace
The fixed point of Meditation
The wellspring of all Songs
The sacred Source
Reverberating Asupiciously
from Absolute Silence
©Ganga Fondan, 2016
The Ancients of the Vedic culture used to describe the soul and the Great Soul as two birds singing within each of us. Every soul is enmeshed with earthly life and experiences a restlessness and is ever in contact with another bird which represents the Great Oness within which sings its Divine inspirations straight from Source and sings the Music which shows the soul its true Home. More and more I feel this to be true within my Heart and whenever I forget, the soul gets agitated and needs to listen and look up to its Divine Essence again.
but where they are not worshipped, all religious ceremonies become futile.”
According to the vedic translation.
All Rights Reserved.
Explore/INTERESTINGNESS Group
Highest position: 48 on Thursday, March 22, 2007
Diyas and Agarbattis (Incense sticks) on the ghat during Chhath Puja celebrations, an ancient Hindu Vedic festival celebrated 6 days after Diwali.
Featured Image from Sonata Series
Sonata concentrates on seeing rather than looking. In our waking-state, we look at things all the time but consciously unless chosen to do we make the effort to see. This on-going series concentrates on the elements of design ; color, line, shape texture form and pattern. Each image composes of a singular point of interest to achieve photographic satisfaction. Here the visible, mundane & overlooked has its moment.
Nkosi.artiste@gmail.com
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Chance Nkosi Gomez known initiated by H.H Swami Jyotirmayanda as Sri Govinda walks an integral yogic path in which photography is the primary creative field of expression. The medium was introduced during sophomore year of high school by educator Dr. Devin Marsh of Robert Morgan Educational Center. Coming into alignment with light, its nature and articulating the camera was the focus during that time. Thereafter while completing a Photographic Technology Degree, the realization of what made an image “striking” came to the foreground of the inner dialogue. These college years brought forth major absorption and reflection as an apprentice to photographer and educator Tony A. Chirinos of Miami Dade College. The process of working towards a singular idea of interest and thus building a series became the heading from here on while the camera aided in cultivating an adherence to the present moment. The viewfinder resembles a doorway to the unified field of consciousness in which line, shape, form, color, value, texture all dissolve. It is here that the yogi is reminded of sat-chit-ananda (the supreme reality as all-pervading; pure consciousness). As of May 2024 Govinda has completed his 300hr yoga teacher training program at Sattva Yoga Academy studying from Master Yogi Anand Mehrotra in Rishikesh, India, Himalayas. This has strengthened his personal Sadhana and allows one to carry and share ancient Vedic Technology leading others in ultimately directing their intellect to bloom into intuition. As awareness and self-realization grows so does the imagery that is all at once divine in the mastery of capturing and controlling light. Over the last seven years he has self-published six photographic books, Follow me i’ll be right behind you (2017), Sonata - Minimal Study (2018), Birds Singing Lies (2018), Rwanda (2019), Where does the body begin? (2019) & Swayam Jyotis (2023). Currently, Govinda is employed at the Leica Store Miami as a camera specialist and starting his journey as a practitioner of yoga ॐ
Students of Gurukul vedic school of varanasi performing early morning prayers near river ganges in one of the ghats of Varanasi.
Varanasi | Uttarpradesh | Feb '17
Sree Padmanabhaswamy temple is a Vedic temple dedicated to Lord Vishnu located in Thiruvananthapuram, India, in the state of Kerala. The shrine is run by a trust headed by the royal family of Travancore.
The Temple has references in Epics and Puranas. Srimad Bhagavatha says that Balarama visited this Temple, bathed in Padmatheertham and made several offerings. Nammalwar, 9th century poet and one among the 12 Vaishnavite saints of the Alvar tradition, has composed ten hymns in praise of Lord Padmanabha. Some well known scholars, writers and historians, like the late Dr. L.A.Ravi Varma of Travancore, have expressed the view that this Temple was established on the first day of Kali Yuga (which is over 5000 years ago). The legends of the Temple are handed down through the centuries. One such legend which finds a place in the old palm leaf records of the Temple, as also in the famous grantha entitled “Ananthasayana Mahatmya”, mentions that it was consecrated by a Tulu Brahmin hermit named Divakara Muni. On the 950th year of Kali Yuga a reinstallation of the idol was done. In the 960th Kali year King Kotha Marthandan built the Abhisravana Mandapam.
The story as narrated in the Ananthasayana Mahatmya goes as follows:
Divakara Muni was a great Vishnu Bhaktha. While at ‘Aanarthadesa’, he performed deep tapas. One day Maha Vishnu appeared before the sage as a lovely child. The charming child attracted the attention of the sage. He requested the God-child to stay with him. The child made his stay conditional. Accordingly, the Sanyasi should treat him with respect. On failing to do so, he would vanish at once. This was accepted and the child stayed with him. The hermit gave him great care and tolerated the childish pranks. One day, when the sanyasi was in deep meditation at his prayers, the child took the ‘salagram’ which the sanyasi was using for worship and put it into his mouth and made such a nuisance of himself that Divakara Mini was greatly angered and could tolerate it no further. He thereupon chastised the child. In accordance with the earlier agreement, immediately the child ran away and disappeared from the spot. While going he said, “If you wish to see me again, you will find me again in Ananthankaadu”. It was only then that Divakara Muni realized who his erstwhile child guest had been. The hermit was stricken with inconsolable grief and for many days followed what, he believed was the route taken by the child foregoing food, rest and sleep in the process.
Finally he reached a wooded area near the sea coast, caught a glimpse of the child disappearing into a huge ‘Ilappa’ tree. Immediately the tree fell into the ground and it assumed the form of Sree Maha Vishnu. The divine form had its head at ‘Thiruvallam’(a place about 3 miles from East Fort at where the Temple of Sree Padmanabha Swamy is located) and its feet at ‘Trippapur’ (5 miles away towards the north). Overawed by the majesty and the size of the divine form, which manifested before him, the Sanyasi prayed to the Lord to condense Himself in size so that he could behold Him. There upon the image of the Lord shrank to a size, three times the length of the Sanyasy’s Yoga Dand. His prayers had been granted. He immediately offered a raw mango in a coconut shell(still this offering continues). The Lord ordained that, poojas to Him should be conducted by Tulu Brahmins. To this day half the number of poojaris(priests) in this Temple represent Tulu region.
Source:http://www.sreepadmanabhaswamytemple.org
A shot taken during a photo walk in Tanjore. This place was made up of complete swamp and dumped buildings. Here's one such.
This would have been more effective if i had taken it in fisheye. but none the less, the color and mood of this picture , i guess, compensates that.
There is a photographer called Ajay Menon from india (kerla) one of the best i know when it comes to mood and color of the pictures (www.flickr.com/photos/ajaymenon/) Inspired the color from him !.
Vedic Enlightenment !
Situated on the banks of Ganges Varanashi is the spiritual capital of India particularly for the Hindus. At Dashaswamedh Ghats (banks with stairs that leads to the river) many devotees and saints assemble during Aarti (evening prayer). The saint id the picture clad typical Vedic dresses and accessories.
This lighted lamp signifies the Vedic chant "Thamaso ma jyothirgamaya" that means "Lead me from darkness to light". Let us usher the new year 2014 to remove all elements of darkness like hatred from the human mind and fill them with light...the light of love
The genesis of modern understanding of Greek mythology is regarded by some scholars as a double reaction at the end of the 18th century against "the traditional attitude of Christian animosity mixed with disdain, which had prevailed for centuries", in which the Christian reinterpretation of myth as a "lie" or fable had been retained.[1] In Germany, by about 1795, there was a growing interest in Homer and Greek mythology. In Göttingen Johann Matthias Gesner began to revive Greek studies and a new humanistic spirit. His successor, Christian Gottlob Heyne, worked with Johann Joachim Winckelmann, and laid the foundations for mythological research both in Germany and elsewhere. Heyne approached the myth as a philologist and shaped the educated Germans' conception of antiquity for nearly half a century, during which ancient Greece exerted an intense influence on intellectual life in Germany.The development of comparative philology in the 19th century, together with ethnological discoveries in the 20th century, established the science of myth. Since the Romantics, all study of myth has been comparative. Wilhelm Mannhardt, Sir James Frazer, and Stith Thompson employed the comparative approach to collect and classify the themes of folklore and mythology.In 1871 Edward Burnett Tylor published his Primitive Culture, in which he applied the comparative method and tried to explain the origin and evolution of religion.] Tylor's procedure of drawing together material culture, ritual and myth of widely separated cultures influenced both Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell. According to Robert Segal, however, Campbell’s "romantic view of myth is the opposite of a rationalist view, one epitomized by the Victorian anthropologists Edward Tylor and James Frazer".J.F. del Giorgio has added a new turn to the comparative approach, insisting in The Oldest Europeans about present Greek myths being generated by the clash between a Paleolithic European population and the incoming Indo-European tribes.Max Müller applied the new science of comparative mythology to the study of myth, in which he detected the distorted remains of Aryan nature worship. Bronisław Malinowski emphasized the ways myth fulfills common social functions. Claude Lévi-Strauss and other structuralists have compared the formal relations and patterns in myths throughout the world.Evans himself, while studying the Minoan world, drew regularly on Egyptian and Near Eastern evidence for comparison, and the discovery of the Hittite and Ugaritic civilizations has uncovered texts as well as monuments which offer comparative material for ritual and mythology.Sigmund Freud put forward the idea that symbolic communication does not depend on cultural history alone but also on the workings of the psyche. Thus Freud introduced a transhistorical and biological conception of man and a view of myth as an expression of repressed ideas. Dream interpretation is the basis of Freudian myth interpretation and Freud's concept of dreamwork recognizes the importance of contextual relationships for the interpretation of any individual element in a dream. This suggestion would find an important point of rapprochment between the structuralist and psychoanalytic approaches to myth in Freud's thought.Carl Jung extended the transhistorical, psychological approach with his theory of the "collective unconscious" and the archetypes (inherited "archaic" patterns), often encoded in myth, that arise out of it.According to Jung, "myth-forming structural elements must be present in the unconscious psyche".[10] Comparing Jung's methodology with Campbell's theory, Segal concludes that "to interpret a myth Campbell simply identifies the archetypes in it. An interpretation of the Odyssey, for example, would show how Odysseus’s life conforms to a heroic pattern. Jung, by contrast, considers the identification of archetypes merely the first step in the interpretation of a myth".[5] For Jung, myth is no more about gods than about the physical world; it is about the human mind and must be read symbolically. Karl Kerenyi, one of the founders of modern studies in Greek mythology, gave up his early views of myth, in order to apply Jung's theories of archetypes to Greek myth.The origins of Greek mythology are an open question. In antiquity, historians such as Herodotus theorized that the Greek gods had been stolen directly from the Egyptians. Later on, Christian writers tried to explain Hellenic paganism through degeneration of Biblical religion. According to the Scriptural theory, all mythological legends (including Greek mythology) are derived from the narratives of the Scriptures, though the real facts have been disguised and altered. Thus Deucalion is another name for Noah, Hercules for Samson, Arion for Jonah etc.] According to the Historical Theory all the persons mentioned in mythology were once real human beings, and the legends relating to them are merely the additions of later times. Thus the story of Aeolus is supposed to have risen from the fact that Aeolus was the ruler of some islands in the Tyrrhenian Sea.The Allegorical theory supposes that all the ancient myths were allegorical and symbolical. According to the Physical theory the elements of air, fire, and water were originally the objects of religious adoration, and the principal deities were personifications of the powers of nature.The sciences of archaeology and linguistics have been applied to the origins of Greek mythology with some interesting results. Historical linguistics indicates that particular aspects of the Greek pantheon were inherited from Indo-European society (or perhaps both cultures borrowed from another earlier source), as were the roots of the Greek language. Prominent Sanskritist Max Müller attempted to understand an Indo-European religious form by tracing it back to its Aryan, Vedic, "original" manifestation. In 1891, he claimed that "the most important discovery which has been made during the nineteenth century with respect to the ancient history of mankind [...] was this sample equation: Sanskrit Dyaus-pitar = Greek Zeus = Latin Jupiter = Old Norse Tyr".[16] Philologist Georges Dumezil draws a comparison between the Greek Uranus and the Sanskrit Varuna, although there is no hint that he believes them to be originally connected.In other cases, close parallels in character and function suggest a common heritage, yet lack of linguistic evidence makes it difficult to prove, as in the case of the Greek Moirai and the Norns of Norse mythology.Archaeology and mythography, on the other hand, has revealed that the Greeks were inspired by some of the civilizations of Asia Minor and the Near East. Adonis seems to be the Greek counterpart — more clearly in cult than in myth — of a Near Eastern dying god. His name is related to the Semitic invocation "adon" (Lord) and appears in other cultures as Dumuzi, Tammuz or Attis. Cybele is rooted in Anatolian culture, and much of Aphrodite's iconography springs from the Semitic goddesses Inanna, Ishtar and Astarte. The theogonic myths current in the Near East in the second millennium BC, such as the myth of Anu, Kumarbi, and Teshub, contain significant stories of generational conflict. Meyer Reinhold argues that "such Near Eastern theogonic concepts, involving divine succession through violence and generational conflicts for power, found their way — the route is not certain — into Greek mythology. Our prime source is the great theogonic poem of Hesiod".Parallels between the earliest divine generations (Chaos and its children) and Tiamat in the Enuma Elish are also possible.In addition to Indo-European and Near Eastern origins, some scholars have speculated on the debts of Greek mythology to the still poorly understood pre-Hellenic societies of Greece, such as the Minoans and so-called Pelasgians. This is especially true in the case of chthonic deities and mother goddesses. Historians of religion were fascinated by a number of apparently ancient configurations of myth connencted with Crete: the god as bull — Zeus and Europa; Pasiphaë who yields to the bull and gives birth to the Minotaur; agrarian mysteries with a sacred marriage (Demeter's union with Iasion) etc. Crete, Mycenae, Pylos, Thebes and Orchomenus figure so large in later Greek mythology.For some, the three main generations of gods in Hesiod's Theogony (Uranus, Gaia, etc.; the Titans and then the Olympians) suggest a distant echo of a struggle between social groups, mirroring the three major high cultures of Greek civilization: Minoan, Mycenaean and Hellenic. Martin P. Nilsson, Professor of Classical Archaeology, worked on the structure, origins and relationships of the Indo-European languages, and concluded that all great classical Greek myths were tied to Mycenaen centres and were anchored in prehistoric times.Nevertheless, according to Walter Burkert, the iconography of the Cretan Palace Period has provided almost no confirmation of all these theories; nothing points to a bull, sexual symbols are absent and a single seal impression from Knossos showing a boy beneath a sheep is regarded as a scant evidence for the myth of Zeus' childhood.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_understanding_of_Greek_mytho...
The ancient tribes of Kalash, having roots in the Vedic culture and similarities to Aryans, still living in the three valleys of Kalash of Hindukush, Chitral.
Happy Makar Sankranti! According to the Hindu Vedic Astrology, Sun enters the house of Capricorn (Makar) in the course of its celestial path. This marks the beginning of the Winter Solstice, though scientifically, 21st - 22nd December is the real start of Uttarayan(Winter Solastice). Kite flying is an important part of the celebration of Makar Sankranti in many parts of the country.
Chhath is an ancient Hindu Vedic festival historically native to the Indian subcontinent, more specifically, the Indian states of Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh and the Madhesh region of Nepal. The Chhath Puja is dedicated to the Solar deity (Surya) in order to thank him for bestowing the bounties of life on earth and to request the granting of certain wishes.
Lakhs of devotees took a holy dip in the river Ganga here on the occasion of Chhath Puja.
Devotees offered prayers to the Sun God at Dashaswamedh, Rajendra Prasad, Sheetala, Kedar and Assi ghats.
Chhat is the only Vedic Festival dedicated to the Hindu Sun God, Surya and Chhati Maiya (Goddess Usha).The Chhat Puja is performed in order to thank Surya for sustaining life on earth and to request the granting of certain wishes.
The Sun, considered as the god of energy and of the life-force, is worshiped during the Chhath festival to promote well-being, prosperity and progress. The rituals of the festival are rigorous and are observed over a period of four days. They include holy bathing, fasting and abstaining from drinking water (Vratta), standing in water for long periods of time, and offering prashad (prayer offerings) and arghya to the setting and rising sun.
Although the festival is observed most elaborately in Bihar, Jharkhand, Eastern UP and the Terai regions of Nepal in modern times,
The gurukul ancient Vedic school in Puri.
A gurukul is a traditional Indian educational system in which students (shishyas) live with their teacher (guru) and receive instruction. The system originated in Vedic times and emphasizes holistic development, imparting values, practical skills, and spiritual knowledge alongside academic subjects.
In ancient Vedic literature, Māyā literally implies extraordinary power and wisdom, in later Vedic texts and modern literature dedicated to Indian traditions, Māyā connotes a "magic show, an illusion where things appear to be present but are not what they seem". Māyā is also a spiritual concept connoting "that which exists, but is constantly changing and thus is spiritually unreal", and the "power or the principle that conceals the true character of spiritual reality".
In Hinduism, Maya is also an epithet for goddess and the name of a manifestation of Lakshmi, the goddess of "wealth, prosperity and love".
[source: Wikipedia]
Model: The incomparable Rassamee
“Tamso ma Jyotirgamaya
Asato ma Sadgamaya
Mrityor ma Amritangamaya”
(a vedic prayer)
O Almighty,
Lead me from darkness (of ignorance)….towards light (of knowledge)
Lead me from falsehood (of duality)…..towards truth (of unity of all)
Lead me from death (cycle of rebirth)…towards eternity (Nirvana)
*****************************
Thank you so much for your kind wishes, comments, messages, greetings…..I will revert back soon.........
I WISH YOU ALL A VERY HAPPY AND WONDERFUL NEW YEAR 2006
In the recent times, one of those frames of mine that I absolutely love. :)
Was shooting a 'vedic' event today, as part of an assignment, and this frame was available for just a jiffy. Hope you all like it. :)
Mehndi (Hindi:मेहँदी) is the application of henna as a temporary form of skin decoration in India, as well as by expatriate communities from the country. The word mehndi is derived from the Sanskrit word mendhikā. The use of mehndi and turmeric is described in the earliest Vedic ritual books. Haldi(Staining oneself with turmeric paste) as well as mehndi are important Vedic customs as a symbolic representation of the Outer and the Inner Sun. Vedic customs are meant to awaken the "inner light" and so the gold of the inner Sun has an important symbolic function.
Traditional mehndi designs draw the sun on the palm, which in this context represents the mind. Mehndi decorations became fashionable in the West in the late 1990s, where they are sometimes called henna tattoos. Henna is typically applied during special occasions like weddings and Hindu festivals like Karva Chauth, Diwali, Bhaidooj and Teej. In some Hindu festivals, every woman tries to have Henna done on her hands and feet. It is usually drawn on the palms and feet, where the color will be darkest because the skin contains higher levels of keratin which binds temporarily to lawsone, the colorant of henna. Henna was originally used as a form of decoration mainly for brides.Wikipedia
Chitra, also spelled as Citra, is an Indian genre of art that includes painting, sketch and any art form of delineation. The earliest mention of the term Chitra in the context of painting or picture is found in some of the ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism and Pali texts of Buddhism
NOMENCLATURE
Chitra (IAST: Citra, चित्र) is a Sanskrit word that appears in the Vedic texts such as hymns 1.71.1 and 6.65.2 of the Rigveda. There, and other texts such as Vajasaneyi Samhita, Taittiriya Samhita, Satapatha Brahmana and Tandya Brahmana, Chitra means "excellent, clear, bright, colored, anything brightly colored that strikes the eye, brilliantly ornamented, extraordinary that evokes wonder". In the Mahabharata and the Harivamsa, it means "picture, sktech, dilineation", and is presented as a genre of kala (arts). Many texts generally dated to the post-4th-century BCE period, use the term Chitra in the sense of painting, and Chitrakara as a painter. For example, the Sanskrit grammarian Panini in verse 3.2.21 of his Astadhyayi highlights the word chitrakara in this sense. Halls and public spaces to display paintings are called chitrasalas, and the earliest known mention of these are found in the Ramayana and the Mahabharata.
A few Indian regional texts such as Kasyapa silpa refer to painting by others words. For example, abhasa – which literally means "semblance, shining forth", is used in Kasyapa-shilpa to mean as a broader category of painting, of which chitra is one of three types. The verses in section 4.4 of the Kasyapa-silpa state that there are three types of images – those which are immovable (walls, floor, terracota, stucco), movable, and those which are both movable-immovable (stone, wood, gems).[5] In each of these three, states Kasyapa-shipa, are three classes of expression – ardhacitra, citra, and citra-abhasa. Ardhacitra is an art form where a high relief is combined with painting and parts of the body is not seen (it appears to be emerging out of the canvas). The Citra is the form of picture artwork where the whole is represented with or without integrating a relief. Citrabhasha is the form where an image is represented on a canvas or wall with colors (painting). However, states Commaraswamy, the word Abhasa has other meanings depending on the context. For example, in Hindu texts on philosophy, it implies the "field of objective experience" in the sense of the intellectual image internalized by a person during a reading of a subject (such as an epic, tale or fiction), or one during a meditative spiritual experience.
In some Buddhist and Hindu texts on methods to prepare a manuscript (palm leaf) or a composition on a cloth, the terms lekhya and alekhya are also used in the context of a chitra. More specifically, alekhya is the space left while writing a manuscript leaf or cloth, where the artist aims to add a picture or painting to illustrate the text.
HISTORY
The earliest explicit reference to painting in an Indian text is found in verse 4.2 of the Maitri Upanishad where it uses the phrase citrabhittir or "like a painted wall". The Indian art of painting is also mention in a number of Buddhist Pali suttas, but with the modified spelling of Citta. This term is found in the context of either a painting, or painter, or painted-hall (citta-gara) in Majjhima Nikaya 1.127, Samyutta Nikaya 2.101 and 3.152, Vinaya 4.289 and others. Among the Jain texts, it is mentioned in Book 2 of the Acaranga Sutra as it explains that Jaina monk should not indulge in the pleasures of watching a painting.
The Kamasutra, broadly accepted to have been complete by about the 4th-century CE, recommends that the young man should surprise the girl he courts with gifts of color boxes and painted scrolls. The Viddhasalabhanjika – another Hindu kama- and kavya–text uses chitra-simile in verse 1.16, as "pictures painted by the god of love, with the brush of the mind and the canvas of the heart".
The nature of a chitra (painting), how the viewer's mind projects a two dimensional artwork into a three dimensional representation, is used by Asanga in Mahayana Sutralamkara – a 3rd to 5th-century Sanskrit text of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, to explain "non-existent imagination" as follows:
Just as in a picture painted according to rules, there are neither projections nor depressions and yet we see it in three dimensions, so in the non-existent imagination there is no phenomenal differentiation, and yet we behold it.
— Mahayana Sutralamkara 13.7, Translated in French by Sylvain Levi
According to Yoko Taniguchi and Michiyo Mori, the art of painting the caves at the c. 6th-century Buddhas of Bamiyan site in Afghanistan, destroyed by the Taliban Muslims in the late 1990s, were likely introduced to this region from India along with the literature on early Buddhism.
TEXTS
There are many important dedicated Indian treatises on chitra. Some of these are chapters within a larger encyclopedia-like text. These include:
Chitrasutras, chapters 35–43 within the Hindu text Vishnudharmottara Purana (the standard, and oft referred to text in the Indian tradition)
Chitralaksana of Nagnajit (a classic on classical painting, 5th-century CE or earlier making it the oldest known text on Indian painting; but the Sanskrit version has been lost, only version available is in Tibet and it states that it is a translation of a Sanskrit text)
Samarangana Sutradhara (mostly architecture treatise, contains a large section on paintings)
Aparajitaprccha (mostly architecture treatise, contains a large section on paintings)
Manasollasa (an encyclopedia, contains chapters on paintings)
Abhilashitartha chinatamani
Sivatatva ratnakara
Chitra Kaladruma
Silpa ratna
Narada silpa
Sarasvati silpa
Prajapati silpa
Kasyapa silpa
These and other texts on chitra not only discuss the theory and practice of painting, some of them include discussions on how to become a painter, the diversity and the impact of a chitra on viewers, of aesthetics, how the art of painting relates to other arts (kala), methods of preparing the canvas or wall, methods and recipes to make color pigments. For example, the 10th-century Chitra Kaladruma presents recipe for making red color paint from the resin of lac insects. Other colors for the historic frescoes found in India, such as those in the Ajanta Caves, were obtained from nature. They mention earthy and mineral (inorganic) colorants such as yellow and red ochre, orpigment, green celadonite and ultramarine blue (lapis lazuli). The use of organic colorants prepared per a recipe in these texts have been confirmed through residue analysis and modern chromatographic techniques.
THEORY
The Indian concepts of painting are described in a range of texts called the shilpa shastras. These typically begin by attributing this art to divine sources such as Vishvakarma and ancient rishis (sages) such as Narayana and Nagnajit, weaving some mythology, highlighting chitra as a means to express ideas and beauty along with other universal aspects, then proceed to discuss the theory and practice of painting, sketching and other related arts. Manuscripts of many these texts are found in India, while some are known to be lost but are found outside India such as in Tibet and Nepal. Among these are the Citrasutras in the 6th-century Visnudharmottara Purana manuscripts discovered in India, and the Citralaksana manuscript discovered in Tibet (lost in India). This theory include early Indian ideas on how to prepare a canvas or substrate, measurement, proportion, stance, color, shade, projection, the painting's interaction with light, the viewer, how to captivate the mind, and other ideas.
According to the historic Indian tradition, a successful and impactful painting and painter requires a knowledge of the subject – either mythology or real life, as well as a keen sense of observation and knowledge of nature, human behavior, dance, music, song and other arts. For example, section 3.2 of Visnudharmottara Purana discusses these requirements and the contextual knowledge needed in chitra and the artist who produces it. The Chitrasutras in the Vishnudharmottara Purana state that the sculpture and painting arts are related, with the phrase "as in Natya, so in Citra". This relationship links them in rasa (aesthetics) and as forms of expression.
THE PAINTING
A chitra is a form of expression and communication. According to Aparajitaprccha – a 12th-century text on arts and architecture, just like the water reflects the moon, a chitra reflects the world. It is a rupa (form) of how the painter sees or what the painter wants the viewer to observe or feel or experience.
A good painting is one that is alive, breathing, draws in and affects the viewer. It captivates the minds of viewers, despite their diversity. Installed in a sala (hall or room), it enlivens the space.
The ornaments of a painting are its lines, shading, decoration and colors, states the 6th-century Visnudharmottara Purana. It states that there are eight gunas (merits, features) of a chitra that the artist must focus on: posture; proportion; the use of the plumb line; charm; detail (how much and where); verisimilitude; kshaya (loss, foreshortening) and; vrddhi (gain). Among the dosas (demerits, faults) of a painting and related arts, states Chitrasutra, are lines that are weak or thick, absence of variety, errors in scale (oversized eyes, lips, cheeks), inconsistency across the canvas, deviations from the rules of proportion, improper posture or sentiment, and non-merging of colors.
LIMBS OF THE PAINTING
Two historical sets called "chitra anga", or "limbs of painting" are found in Indian texts. According to the Samarangana Sutradhara – an 11th-century Sanskrit text on Hindu architecture and arts, a painting has eight limbs:
Vartika – manufacture of brushes
Bhumibandhana – preparation of base, plaster, canvas
Rekhakarma – sketching
Varnakarma – coloring
Vartanakarma – shading
lekhakarana – outlining
Dvikakarma – second and final lining
Lepyakarma – final coating
According to Yashodhara's Jayamangala, a Sanskrit commentary on Kamasutra, there are sadanga (six limbs)[note 5] in the art of alekhyam and chitra (drawing and painting):
Rupa-bhedah, or form distinction; this requires a knowledge of characteristic marks, diversity, manifested forms that distinguish states of something in the same genus/class
Pramanani, or measure; requires knowledge of measurement and proportion rules (talamana)
Bhava yojanam, or emotion and its joining with other parts of the painting; requires understanding and representing the mood of the subject
Lavanya yojanam, or rasa, charm; requires understanding and representing the inner qualities of the subject
Sadrsyam, or resemblance; requires knowledge of visual correspondence across the canvas
Varnika-bhanga or color-pigment-analysis; requires knowledge how colors distribute on the canvas and how they visually impact the viewer.
These six limbs are arranged stylistically in two ways. First as a set of compound (Rupa-bhedah and Varnika-bhanda), a set of joining (middle two yojnam), and a set of single words (Pramanani and Sadrsyam). Second, states Victor Mair, the six limbs in this Hindu text are paired in a set of differentiation skills (first two), then a pair of aesthetic skills, and finally a pair of technical skills. These limbs parallel the 12th-century Six principles of Chinese painting of Xie He. {refn|group=note|The Hua Chi of Teng Ch'un, a 12th-century Chinese text, mentions the Buddhist temple of Nalanda with frescoes about the Buddha painted inside. It states that the Indian Buddhas look different from those painted by Chinese, as the Indian paintings have Buddha with larger eyes, their ears are curiously stretched and the Buddhas have their right shoulder bare. It then states that the artists first make a drawing of the picture, then paint a vermilion or gold colored base. It also mentions the use of ox-glue and a gum produced from peach trees and willow juice, with the artists preferring the latter. According to Coomaraswamy, the ox-glue in the Indian context mentioned in the Chinese text is probably the same as the recipe found in the Sanskrit text Silparatna, one where the base medium is produced from boiling buffalo skin in milk, followed by drying and blending process.
The six limbs in Jayamangala likely reflect the earliest and more established Hindu tradition for chitra. This is supported by the Chitrasutras found in the Vishnudharmottara Purana. They explicitly mention pramanani and lavanya as key elements of a painting, as well as discuss the other four of the six limbs in other sutras. The Chitrasutra chapters are likely from about the 4th or 5th-century. Numerous other Indian texts touch upon the elements or aspects of a chitra. For example, the Aparajitaprccha states that the essential elements of a painting are: citrabhumi (background), the rekha (lines, sketch), the varna (color), the vartana (shading), the bhusana (decoration) and the rasa (aesthetic experience).
THE PAINTER
The painter (chitrakara, rupakara) must master the fundamentals of measurement and proportions, state the historic chitra texts of India. According to these historic texts, the expert painter masters the skills in measurement, characteristics of subjects, attributes, form, relative proportion, ornament and beauty, states Isabella Nardi – a scholar known for her studies on chitra text and traditions of India. According to the Chitrasutras, a skilled painter needs practice, and is one who is able to paint neck, hands, feet, ears of living beings without ornamentation, as well as paint water waves, flames, smoke, and garments as they get affected by the speed of wind. He paints all types of scenes, ranging from dharma, artha and kama. A painter observes, then remembers, repeating this process till his memory has all the details he needs to paint, states Silparatna. According to Sivatattva Ratnakara, he is well versed in sketching, astute with measurements, skilled in outlining (hastalekha), competent with colors, and ready to diligently mix and combine colors to create his chitra. The painter is a creative person, with an inner sense of rasa (aesthetics).
THE VIEWER
The painter should consider the diversity of viewers, states the Indian tradition of chitra. The experts and critics with much experience with paintings study the lines, shading and aesthetics, the uninitiated visitors and children enjoy the vibrancy of colors, while women tend to be attracted to the ornamentation of form and the emotions. A successful painter tends to captivate a variety of minds. A painter should remember that the visual and aesthetic impact of a painting triggers different responses in different audiences.
The Silparatna – a Sanskrit text on the arts, states that the painting should reflect its intended place and purpose. A theme suitable for a palace or gateway is different from that in a temple or the walls of a home. Scenes of wars, misery, death and suffering are not suitable paintings within homes, but these can be important in a chitrasala (museum with paintings). Auspicious paintings with beautiful colors such as those that cheer and enliven a room are better for homes, states Silparatna.
PRACITICE
According to the art historian Percy Brown, the painting tradition in India is ancient and the persuasive evidence are the oldest known murals at the Jogimara caves. The mention of chitra and related terms in the pre-Buddhist Vedic era texts, the chitra tradition is much older. It is very likely, states Brown, the pre-Buddhist structures had paintings in them. However, the primary building material in ancient India was wood, the colors were organic materials and natural pigments, which when combined with the tropical weather in India would naturally cause the painting to fade, damage and degrade over the centuries. It is not surprising, therefore, that sample paintings and historic evidence for chitra practice are unusual. The few notable surviving examples of chitra are found hidden in caves, where they would be naturally preserved a bit better, longer and would be somewhat protected from the destructive effects of wind, dust, water and biological processes.
Some notable, major surviving examples of historic paintings include:
Murals at Jogimara cave (eight panels of murals, with a Brahmi inscription, 2nd or 1st century BCE, Hindu), oldest known ceiling paintings in India in remote Ramgarh hills of northern Chhattisgarh, below on wall of this cave is a Brahmi inscription in Magadhi language about a girl named Devadasi and a boy named Devadina (either they were lovers and wrote a love-graffiti per one translation, or they were partners who together converted natural caves here into a theatre with painted walls per another translation)
Mural at Sitabhinji Group of Rock Shelters (c. 400 CE Ravanachhaya mural with an inscription, near a Shiva temple in remote Odisha, a non-religious painting), the oldest surviving example of a tempera painting in eastern states of India
Murals at Ajanta caves (Jataka tales, Buddhist), 5th-century CE, Maharashtra
Murals at Badami Cave Temples (Hindu), 6th-century CE, Karnataka (secular paintings along with one of the earliest known painting of a Hindu legend about Shiva and Parvati inside a Vaishnava cave)
Murals at Bagh caves (Hallisalasya dance, Buddhist or Hindu), Madhya Pradesh
Murals at Ellora caves (Flying vidyadharas, Jain), Maharashtra
Frescoes at Sittanavasal cave (Nature scenes likely representing places of Tirthankara sermons, Jain), Tamil Nadu
Frescoes at Thirunadhikkara cave temple (Flowers and a woman, likely a scene of puja offering to Ganesha, another of Vishnu, Hindu), Travancore region, Kerala-Tamil Nadu
Paintings at the Brihadisvara temple (Dancer, Hindu), Tamil Nadu
Manuscript paintings (numerous states such as Gujarat, Kashmir, Kerala, Odisha, Assam; also Nepal, Tibet; Buddhist, Jain, Hindu
Vijayanagara temples (Hindu), Karnataka
Chidambaram temple (Hindu), Tamil Nadu
Chitrachavadi (Hindu, a choultry–mandapa near Madurai with Ramayana frescoes)
Pahari paintings (Hindu), Himachal Pradesh and nearby regions
Rajput paintings (Hindu), Rajasthan
Deccan paintings (Hindu, Jain)
Kerala paintings (Hindu)
Telangana paintings (Hindu)
Mughal paintings (Indo-Islamic)
CONTEMPORARY CULTURE
Kalamkari (Hindu)
Pattas (Jain, Hindu)
WIKIPEDIA
In Hinduism, Yajna is a ritual of sacrific derived from the practice of Vedic times. It is performed to please the Devas, or sometimes the Supreme Spirit Brahman. An essential element is the sacrificial fire (the divine Agni) into which oblations are poured, as everything that is offered in the divine Agni is believed to reach the Devas. (info wikipedia)
Shot on 'Sankaranthi' day at 'Sri Naga Kanyaka Durga Parameshwari' Temple, Arasumakanu, Shadimane, Udupi District, Karnataka, India.
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