This silk textile composed of fifteen fragments, including two in a private collection, depicts three forms of the vyala, a mythological creature whose leonine body is combined with parts of other animals. This form had its origins in traditional Indian art, where it was used in architectural settings as a symbolic guard for Hindu temples. Here, all three vyalas are winged, and the central form has the head of an elephant.
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Title:Textile Fragments
Date:15th–16th century
Geography:Attributed to India
Medium:Silk; samite
Dimensions:Largest Fragment: L. 11 9/16 in. (29.3 cm) W. 7 in. (17.8 cm)
Classification:Textiles-Woven
Credit Line:Gift of Michael and Jacqueline Franses, 1993
Object Number:1993.2a–m
Textile Fragments
Fifteen fragments of varying sizes constitute what once would have been a fairly large textile. The design, woven in the warp direction, shows two alternating forms of the mythical beast vyala (or yali), a composite winged creature with a leonine body. Rendered in yellow against a dark blue background, they are enclosed within rectangular compartments and surrounded by a pearl border. A narrow band of floral design separates the compartments. The two largest fragments retain a selvage, much of their surrounding borders, and enough of the central figure to indicate that the original design consisted of at least two parallel registers with a continuously repeated lattice pattern. Of the other thirteen fragments, five are portions of the vyala design and the remaining eight are from borders that run parallel to the warps.
The vyala, depicted with heads in various animal forms, has enjoyed longevity in Indian art.[1] One of the creatures here has a lion’s head with snarling fangs and a small deerlike quadruped perched on its raised foreleg. The other, with a head terminating in an elephant’s snout, exhibits a gentler aspect. Both have taut, sinuous bodies pinched near the middle, flaming wings and manes, and long tails terminating in a lotus or stylized leaf.
Several aspects of these textile fragments are unusual. It is more typical to see the vyala motif organized within pearl-bordered roundels or ogives—a layout similar to those of Islamic textiles in this technique—than within the pearl-bordered rectangular compartments seen here.[2] Another uncommon feature is the dark blue background, rather than the red usually found in Indian textiles of this type.[3]
Little is yet known about complex silk draw-loom weaving in India before the Mughal period, and such textiles appeared on the international art market from Tibetan sources only in the 1980s and 1990s. This silk, a rare example of its type, is among the earliest in a small group of medieval silks from India, the production of which has been attributed to the important textile centers of Gujarat, the Deccan, and the Assam–North Bengal region.[4]
Qamar Adamjee in [Ekhtiar, Soucek, Canby, and Haidar 2011]
Footnotes:
1. For sculpture, see Dhaky, Madhusudan A. The Vyala Figures on the Mediaeval Temples of India. Indian Civilization Series, 2. Varanasi, 1965; for metalwork, see Zebrowski, Mark. Gold, Silver and Bronze from Mughal India. London, 1997, pls. 106–13; for textiles, see Galloway, Francesca. Global India: Court, Trade and Influence, 1300–1900. Dealer catalogue. London, 2009, nos. 2–5; and Riboud, Krishna, et al. Samit et lampas: Motifs indiens/Indian Motifs. Association pour l’étude et la documentation des textiles d’Asie. Calico Museum of Textiles. Paris and Ahmedabad, 1998, pp. 66, 71, 75, 79. See also India: Art and Culture, 1300–1900. Exhibition, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Catalogue by Stuart Cary Welch. New York, 1985; and Rahul Jain 2011, pp. 22–25, no. 3a (reference not included in the catalogue's bibliography).
2. Galloway 2009, nos. 2–6 (see note 1 above). This layout in rectangular compartments also recalls the form of the square tiles with molded animal designs and pearl borders attributed to the late twelfth and early thirteenth century from Ghazni, Afghanistan (Metropolitan Museum, acc. nos. 1975.193.4–6).
3. Crill 1995, p. 41 (reference not included in the catalogue's bibliography); Riboud et al. 1998 (see note 1 above); Galloway 2009 (see note 1 above); Dye, Joseph M., III. The Arts of India: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Richmond, 2001, p. 458.
4. Cohen, Steven. "A Group of Early Silks: A Tree Motif." In The Woven Silks of India, edited by J. Dhamija. Bombay, 1995, pp. 29, 31; Rahul Jain in Galloway 2009, p. 6 (see note 1 above); Galloway, Francesca. Islamic Courtly Textiles and Trade Goods, Fourteenth–Nineteenth Century. Dealer catalogue. London, 2011, no. 1.
possibly a Buddhist Monastery, Tibet; [ Jeremy Pine Fine Art, Hong Kong]; Michael and Jacqueline Franses, London (until 1993; gifted to MMA)
London. Victoria and Albert Museum, UK Indemnity. "The Fabric of India," October 3, 2015–January 10, 2016, no. 62.
"M.M.A. Recent Acquisitions 1992–93." Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin vol. 51, no. 2 (Fall 1993). p. 20, ill. (color).
Dodds, Dennis R., and Murray L. Eiland Jr., ed. Oriental Rugs from Atlantic Collections. Philadelphia, 1996. no. 324, p. 262.
Ekhtiar, Maryam, Priscilla P. Soucek, Sheila R. Canby, and Navina Haidar, ed. Masterpieces from the Department of Islamic Art in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1st ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2011. no. 243, pp. 347–48, ill. (color).
Crill, Rosemary. The Fabric of India. London: Victoria and Albert Museum, 2015. no. 62, pp. 54, 56, ill. (color).
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