Traditions: Wax-Tread Metal Images of Eastern India

This dissertation focuses on living sculptural traditions--wax-thread, cast metal images--from Phulbani district, Orissa, and Bastar district, Madhya Pradesh. Such images have been the object of several interrelated but not yet fully integrated discourses: formal/aesthetic, technological, and ethnographic. My study attempts to establish regional and stylistic classifications for these particular sculptures, to make explicit the meanings of their forms, and third, to provide a larger conceptual framework for their study. By combining art-historical analysis with field research, I have attempted to place these bronzes within the changing ritual, cultural, and commercial contexts through which craftsmen and clients interact. This ensemble of possible relationships between maker and consumer can inform not only the work commissioned, but the processes by which style, iconography, and technology have been transmitted. My intention in studying a selected sample of these living traditions has been to explore in part how art functions as both communication and commodity. These specialized studies--the images and image makers of Phulbani, Bastar, and the individual artist Jaidev Baghel of Bastar--act as points of triangulation for locating the continuities, discontinuities, and transformations of the wax-thread tradition. My conclusions in comparing these traditions dramatically underscore the uniqueness of response by artisans within their separate communities. With only a single source of patronage, the contemporary casting tradition in Phulbani has remained relatively static. The Bastar community, in contrast, has been responsive to new markets and marketing opportunities. Theirs is an "art" in transition, with the modern artisan Baghel leading the way into the future. Results of my field investigations confirm the continuing ritual use of bronzes in their communities; a pantheon of local and tribal deities, heretofore not clearly articulated; as well as an indigenous system for classifying Bastar bronzes into regional styles. My work has been primarily among the artisans and their voice is privileged in this initial endeavor. Future research will be directed towards the diversity of clienteles and their complex role in shaping both the process and product of artistic creation.