Religious Cultural artifacts of India - Essay Example

Amongst the most vivacious illustration of admired visual art found in Indian towns and cities are the religious posters and calendars showing saints, and places of reverence and worship, obtainable at many roadside stalls near temples, mosques, and ornamented at walls inside homes, shops, or in worship-corners. While such visual depiction may have existed in the past in popular forms of painting, the introduction of printing press and the mass construction industry in the 20th century transformed it into a matured mass culture, characterized by its own popular aesthetics, the interpretation of the myths, and the marketing strategy.

While it is simple to find religious posters and charts for a Hindu follower in hefty numbers and variety, it is also not difficult to get posters depicting Muslim themes and legends. Although most Muslim posters available in India portray the shrines at Mecca and Medina or the Quranic verses in calligraphy, one can also discover the portraits of saints, their shrines, and the miracles, represented as brilliantly as in a typical Hindu mythological picture. The metaphors of the shrines at Mecca and Medina in Saudi-Arabia, the major religious center for the Muslims, are the most extensively used sanctified icons of popular culture amongst Muslim population all over the world.

The cube-shaped shrine of Mecca, to which the Muslims turn for prayers, and the green dome of Medina, surrounded by the minarets, the names Allah and Muhammad in large Arabic calligraphy, and possibly, a crescent and star, are icons that can be seen in almost every Muslim family in some structure or the other - a photo realistic painting or a creative variation, by a performer who probably never gone to Arabia, or may not essentially be a Muslim! As the creation of portraits, other than that of Mecca and Medina, is generally not considered as a right act in Islam, the written words are of supreme importance, the calligraphy of Quranic verses and other blessed texts is the next preference of the Muslim artists.

For years, the Perso-Arabic calligraphists have also been making art with the 'pictorialization' of the text, turning words into shapes of animals, birds, human postures, and other inanimate objects. This, even though has been treasured in the Muslim world as a innovation, has also met with some disapproval. Nevertheless, one can find a wide variety of calligraphic themes in the Indian trendy posters. The more appealing theme, the heart of this study, is the interpretation of Muslim saints, their miracles and other tradition.

Many posters depict the images of the mausoleums or the tomb complexes of famous saints, often with the personage of the saint himself, complete with the icons of his strange mythology and miracles, such as the vicious animals he disciplined, the oceans he crossed on barefoot, and so on. Similar to the tradition of Hindu gods and goddesses, the Muslim saints are shown with extra charisma and glowing personalities, wearing imposing robes and turbans. CULTURAL ARTIFACT AND ITS IMPACT: The religious posters participate actively in what can be called the stereotyping of the representation of certain communities and of the genders.

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