Exhibitionist Sculptures from South India

This 'Yonitrantric' figure of Kali in menstrual flux is like a handsome, well-carved sheela-na-gig. cf Ballinderry Castle
It was, however, carved in the 17th century. Could the influence have travelled from Ireland to India ?
Kali is the (currently impotent!) goddess-challenger of demonic testosteronic madness.

Similar wooden figures of the 17th and 18th century depict goddesses giving birth.

 

 

 

 

 

This intentionally-headless terra-cotta figure from Uttar Pradesh, on the other hand, is one of several which date from around the 2nd century BCE, and which (like Romanesque female exhibitionists) were influenced by Gorgon-headed Baubo figurines in the same material from Greece and Asia Minor.

The headlessness of the figure indicates that it is not a goddess, but a "shameless" aid to fertility.

 

 

See Ajit Mookerjee: KALI - The Feminine Force
London 1988
(Thames and Hudson)

obtainable through www.abebooks.com

 


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