The
handicrafts of Sri Lanka, bewildering in their range & variety, today, are
in fact the products of a continuous process of development of human skills
& resources stretching far back in to the past. These were & still survive
as traditional crafts serving as the backbone of the rural economy during the
early & mediaeval periods of the island's history. There importance never
diminished from the earliest times when man started to use the raw materials he
came across in daily life for satisfying basic needs.
While
adapting the available material for domestic use, in the early stages, he did
not lose sight of its appeal to himself & his social group in terms of
design, color combination, format & appearance. These concepts were slow in
evolving, but the earliest crafts products of ours as of any other old culture
show a delectable blending of the twin function of utility & aesthetic
sensitivity. Crafts therefore, were considered to important & craft
training so indispensable to even an artist that the arts & crafts grew in
mutual relationship. There was hardly any distinction between the arts &
crafts in the early phases of creative work in Sri Lanka.
Our
early art shows that all the great works of architecture, sculpture & even
painting possessed a high degree of skilled craftsmanship. Likewise the
best products of the craftsmen's arts, in whatever material they were made,
mainly for the royal & high-ranking patrons, bore the hallmark of artistic
excellence in addition to superb craftsmanship. Their parallel existence &
mutual influence enriched the arts & the crafts in their revolting
rendering them inseparable with a common heritage of design, motifs &
forms.
The
craftsman, even more than a artist, attained a very high status in the
mediaeval period of history which saw the efflorescence of traditional crafts
in the kandyn kingdom. Under a feudal system of society regulated by a
hierarchical caste structure, service to the king & the royal circle became
the prime duty of the best craftsmen, who were thus able to earn the little of
"master craftsmen" by virtue of their skill professionalism.
Even the crafts had their own gradation, the richer & more valuable the
material, the higher the status of using craftsman. Therefore jewellery work
with gold & gems was a crafts on the highest pedestal, ivory carving coming
next in importance, both forms of craftsmanship equally recognized for the
grant of sumptuous awards from royalty.
It must also be mentioned here
that the inspiration to produce the best crafted objects had a strong link with
faith & religious devotion. Votive figures as well as statues of the lord
Buddha & the deities of popular religion, produced in various materials,
show the motivation of religion as the dominant factor shaping their skills in
casting & carving of metals. It is also observed that the several
categories of crafts owe their origin to the ceremonial & ritualistic
practices of the temples & the attendant festivities including processions
& exhibitions of village merchandise.
The
classical tradition of arts which produced masterpieces like the frescoes of Sigiriya,
the architectural monuments of Anuradhapura & Polonnaruwa & the massive
Buddhist sculptures of those times was later replaced by the folk tradition in
which not so much the creative artist but the skilled craftsman played a
leading role Turing out utilitarian products satisfying society's needs &
providing artistic appeal at the same time. In this period, painting was not
practiced as a fine art but as a folk art with its own technique, symbolism
& color scheme, for edifying & educative purposes.
Figure
sculpture also assumed a popular character with stucco or clay being
substituted for stone. The minor arts such as metal work of various kinds,
bone-horn-shell-work, lace-work, weaving, textile-making, basket-work & a
wide range of ancillary arts & crafts provided the people with their
domestic. Requirements & the craftsmen, engaged in them, with suitable
employment. The folk arts which constitute the sum-total of the traditional art
forms, emerging with the materials & services available, received as much
acceptance as the “cultured" arts in feudal society. To these were added
the products contributed by the collage industries which sustained village life
at a satisfactory economic level. These arts were also cherished by the people
as they reflected their legendary lore & popular beliefs which were
transmuted into motifs & designs of lasting beauty & appeal. The
history of folk arts also strongly emphasizes how a particular form or type
grew & decayed according to the likes & dislikes of the peoples. Their
dynamism also prevented their complete disintegration for they were able to
emerge in a new form incorporating new elements if the old form was no longer
acceptable. These arts forms also possessed the characteristic quality of using
gay & striking colors, a prominent feature in kandyn art ( with
red,yellow,black & white) but above all the folk artist executed the
delicate work with a high sense of dedication.
From
Anuradhapura periods onwards handicrafts of the country have shown certain
characteristic features associated with a developed standard of craftsmanship.
Anuradhapura was noted for pottery, metal ware, jewellery & ivory products.
Recent archaeological finds form the cultural triangle excavation in the area
have thrown further light on this aspect & confirmed the use of quality
ceramic ware & jewellery during the period. The Polonnaruwa epoch,
following Anuradhapura, is remembered especially for its terra-cotta products
& bronzes showing visible traces of S.Indian cultural influences. Before
the advent of western foreign invaders to the land, in the 16th c A.D, the
crafts had reached their efflorescence after centuries of dedicated effort on
the part of traditional craftsmen. In the mediaeval era, extending from the
16th century to the 18th century, the truly authentic craft traditions of the
country were systematically organized by an efficient system of workshop training
& apprenticeship, comprehensive in scope & method. It was indeed a
period of high specialization in the respective crafts dealing with prize
metals where the excellence of skills & expertise were adequately
recognized.
Service
to the king & the official of high rank by the best craftsmen of the land
produced high standards of production in craftsmanship. But satisfactions of
domestic needs in the royal household as well as the requiremants of ordinary
folk were not neglected. A wide range of objects used by many segments of
society, in the past, show the same attention to detail & sense of matching
material to form, evident in whatever the products, be it carved in laid or
lacquered. The household goods & items of personal use testify to the wide
practice of crafts by a large range of craftsmen, who cared & catered to
the needs of the community as a whole. Kitchen utensils, simple tools &
implements & even the humble products made from ruch, reed,clag & cane,
reflect the sense of discipline & feeling of social obligation that seem to
have characterized the making of ordinary ware.
The
growth of handicrafts, therefore, can be considered in three phases of
socio-religious development entailing religious motivation (in the earliest
phase) royal patronage & everyday use. The evolution of the arts &
crafts of Sri Lanka, which must be considered jointly in any overview of the
handicrafts, shows two patent influences at work. The early phase is marked by
characteristic features drawing upon Indians norms & standards, especially
in the arts of architecture & sculpture. Ananda Coomaraswami , on the
earliest critics studying the problems connected with the origins of Sinhalese
art, has acknowledge Sri Lanka’s debt to Indian art, calling Sinhalese art as
essentially Indian.
He
also states further that in the mediaeval period, the traditions of Sinhalese
art, as represented by the indigenous craftsmen of the island, descended from
the Aryan immigrants to Sri Lanka, led by Vijaya, were integrated with the
traditions later introduced by artisans of south Indian origin, the kammalar(
skt karmara). It is also his opinion that both the north Indian & later
south Indian immigrant craftsmen as well as the indigenous craftsmen of Sri
Lanka belong to an original stock constituting a guild of artificers, who
migrated in to various parts of India &S.E Asia , carrying a common message
of craftsmanship which they sought to propagate in the countries where they
eventually settled down. Sri Lanka’s renowned archaeologist, “Senarath Paranawithna”,
also , lays emphasis on the indigenous Sinhalese art of early times in relation
to the great cultural & artistic traditions if India & especially the
influences stemming from the spread of Buddhism & its humanistic
philosophy. He states further that “the ancient arts of Ceylon like that of
java or indo-china, possesses a distinctive character of it’s own” the use of
Hindu & Buddhist models was, therefore, an important factor in the growth
of the arts in the island. Not only the arts, but the arts of the country too,
show in their phases of development the specific foreign influences that seem
to have determined their character & composition. In the earliest stages
the growth of the architectural & plastic arts of Sri Lanka distinctly
reflects the conceptions introduced by Indian artists & craftsmen who were
employed by the Sinhalese rulers. But these ideas were suitably adapted by the
local artists in such a way that an indigenous artistic tradition developed
under the benign influence f the Buddhist faith which most of them embraced
& therefore, attempted to propagate through their artistic work. The
sculpture of the early period & the Buddha images in particular, attest to
the overwhelming influences of Andhra art on that of early Ceylon. Yet, the
early sculpture of the island exhibit, conspicuously, according to another
critic, the Theravada Buddhist ideology as practiced by the Sinhalese artists
of Anuradhapura &Polonnaruwa. The two great centers of classical Buddhist
culture.
When
north Indian influence waned & the repeated invasions of the country by
south India rulers commenced in the later times, Aryan Buddhist styles
gradually came into contact with Dravidian style of art & decoration &
were integrated in to the existing forms. Architectural monuments, found in
Polonnaruwa, in the 12th & 13th centuries & the
bronze figures of the same period furnish evidence of the dominance of
Dravidian arts as exemplified in the ornamental motifs & techniques
introduced in to Sinhalese stone-work & carving. But happily, here too, the
chastening influence of Theravadha
Buddhism prevented a complete breaking away from artistic traditions of
the former period. Sinhalese arts was undergoing a change, but its resilience
& ability to adapt it self to the new conditions were : its greatest
assets. This period also marks the end of the classical tradition & was the precursor of the mediaeval art of the
Sinhalese, which began to concentrate on decoration & even over
ornamentation to the detriment of originality of conception & designs.
