Monday, August 14, 2017

Image: Indra



Indra on Airavata
painting circa 1820
(from the British Museum)

Here is the description from the British Museum page: Gouache painting on paper from a portfolio of sixty-three paintings of deities and daily life. Indra, guardian of the east, rides on his elephant, Airāvata. The red-complexioned and thousand eyed god is accompanied by two attendants on foot, one carrying a parasol, the other carrying a spear. Indra has a tanka (chisel) in his upper right hand, a vajra (thunderbolt) in his upper left, and in the lower right, a sword with a serrated edge. Airāvata carries a garland of flowers in his trunk.