- Title
- Shiva's Twilight Dance of Frenzy
- Date Made
- circa 1775-1800
- Medium
- Ink and opaque watercolor on paper
- Dimensions
- 9 x 11 3/4 in. (22.86 x 29.845 cm)
Frame: 14 × 19 in. (35.56 × 48.26 cm)
- Accession Number
- M.77.154.31
- Collecting Area
- South and Southeast Asian Art
- Curatorial Notes
The Hindu god Shiva exuberantly performs the twilight Dance of Frenzy (sandhya tandava), which is a more dynamic dance than the Dance of Bliss (ananda tandava) that Shiva performs as the Lord of Dance (Nataraja; see M.75.1). Here, Shiva dances with his right leg outstretched and his weight on his right leg and hip thrust to the left. His arms are flung wide with his left hand holding a horn. His long hair (jatas) streams to his right from the dance movement, while his leopard skin garment and cobra worn as a necklace stream to his left. He is accompanied by his six-headed son Karttikeya beating a circular metal drum, his wife Parvati playing a vina, his elephant-headed son Ganesha playing a rattle drum and a lute, his thousand-armed devotee Banasura playing multiple mridangam drums, and his troop of demigod attendants (ganas) playing horns and percussion instruments.
Additional versions of this composition, attributed variously to Kangra and Chamba, are in the Allahabad Museum; Bharat Kala Bhavan, Varanasi; Indian Museum, Kolkata; National Museum, New Delhi; and the Polsky Collection, New York. See also M.74.102.1.
- Selected Bibliography
- Pal, Pratapaditya and Catherine Glynn. The Sensuous Line: Indian Drawings from the Paul F. Walter Collection. Los Angeles: Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1976.
