How we see the world, how we perceive it, it’s greatly influenced by the culture we grow and live in. Therefore, when it comes to aesthetics, the cultural background matters. It matters how some of our senses have been sharpened by our surroundings, while the others have been blunted. In other words, our past experiences colour our present. That’s also the case when we talk about Indian aesthetics — it’s the philosophical and cultural underpinnings of India that have shaped its aesthetics.
One key way in which Indian approach to art differs from its western counterpart is its holistic nature. For instance, if you understand Shakespeare, this, in no way guarantees that you would also understand Mozart, or see through the colours and symbolism of Van Gogh’s stars. When it comes to Indian art, however, every form holds the key to every other form.
So, a raga will find a space, not just in music, but in aesthetic landscapes of pahari miniature too. Or a story of Radha Krishna will appear, not just in the literary works of storytellers, but in the movements of kathak and melodies of thumri too. Everything is interconnected, there are no boundaries, and in the end, it all leads to the One as this Bollywood song recounts:
Wo jo mujh mein samaya, wo jo tujh mein samaya, Maula wahi wahi Maya. Translation: He who is inside me, He who is inside you, He is the Lord and He is the mystery.
This has obvious philosophical roots in the Indian tradition where perception is regarded as a valid source of intellectual enquiry and where every intellectual enquiry is made with the goal of spiritual liberation. And when such an enquiry is made, we inevitably enter the realm of Indian aesthetics.
So… how do we approach the Indian aesthetics, philosophically speaking?
For that we’ll have to start with Bharatamuni’s Rasa theory of aesthetics. Rasa, in its essence, means savouring. The emotional state your brain achieves when your senses encounter an experience. It’s a lingering feeling, which is very hard to explain, but you can feel it, nevertheless.
The Rasa theory originates in Bharatamuni’s Natya Shastra, a Sanskrit treatise on performing arts. It suggests that the object or meaning that is sought to be conveyed in art is in the nature of an emotional effect of diverse human experience on man’s mind and heart. It is possible, Bharatamuni demonstrates, to enumerate the whole range of emotions, and to analyse the structure of those emotions in terms of cause, physical correlate and their effect on our being.
The Rasa theory identifies nine emotional states which correspond to nine Rasas (flavours or expressions) in art. These have been described below:
| Rati (Love) | Sringara Rasa (Romance) |
| Hasa (Laughter) | Hasya Rasa (Comedy) |
| Soka (Grief) | Karuna Rasa (Compassion) |
| Krodha (Anger) | Raudra Rasa (Wrath/Fury) |
| Utsaha (Enthusiasm) | Vira Rasa (Heroism) |
| Bhaya (Fear) | Bhayanaka Rasa (Fear) |
| Jugupsa (Disgust) | Bibhatsa Rasa (Repulsion) |
| Vismaya (Astonishment) | Adbhuta Rasa (Amazement) |
| Nirveda (Renunciation) | Santa Rasa (Tranquility) |
As you can see, the above chart explains an emotion and its corresponding Rasa which would be depicted through aesthetics (in visual arts, for instance).
The idea is quite straightforward. When you perceive a sensation (image, sound, taste etc), it leads to a particular emotional state. And a connection is established between you and the object you’re perceiving. This is true for every artistic experience: it becomes a conversation between two people. You may never meet the artist, they may not even live at the same time as you, but a conversation still takes place, nonetheless. And fundamentally, it’s one that, in one way or another, conveys, ‘We may have had different experiences, but we both know what this pain feels like, and I’m here to tell you that it’s going to be okay.’
The ancient Indian philosophers understood the therapeutic value of art. They knew that every single emotion can be safely explored through an aesthetic experience. That it can heal you, and at the same time, act as an emotional training ground to work out underlying fear, panic, anger, frustration, even hatred, and contempt. And that’s what the Indian aesthetics sought out to do.
Kalampedia 