A COPPER ALLOY FIGURE OF DEVI


SOUTH INDIA, KERALA, 16TH CENTURY14 1/8 in. (35.9 cm) high
|This ornate Keralan bronze depicts an ample-bodied goddess with a crown of blooming lotuses. Her floral imagery, left-sided tilt, and tall throne back with a single ornamented edge on the right, indicate this goddess probably once flanked the proper left side of her consort Krishna or Vishnu, and identifies her as Satyabhama or Bhudevi, Hinduism's Earth Goddess.   The bronze is almost identical to a goddess in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (M.2005.73), however the lotus buds of the LACMA piece have yet to unfurl. Pal suggests the latter might have flanked Vishnu's right, representing his other consort Lakshmi (Pal, The Divine Presence, Los Angeles, 1978, p.19). The two bronzes seem a likely pair except for the hands holding the flower stems, which do not form a symmetrical match. Nonetheless, the two certainly originate from the same workshop and period. A later pair of goddesses in the Norton Simon Museum of Art show similar treatment of the base, physiognomy, and body chain in the Keralan style (Pal Art of the Indian Sub-Continent, Pasadena, 2003, p.305, nos.227A&B). Provenance Private Collection of Jean-Claude Moreau-Gobard (1921-2005), Paris Thence by descent