During my time in south India I visited an ashram. I had no prior knowledge that these existed but visiting them proved really interesting and relevant to my Context of Practice topic on Homo sapiens relationship with animals.
What is an ashram?
The term ashram often denotes a locus of Hindu cultural activity such as yoga, music study or religious instruction. The one I visited was dedicated to yoga and it had been created to imbue a sense of peace but also purpose for the residents. Staying from 2 weeks to up to over a year, the people in the ashram are not allowed money, must do their duties (given jobs or chores around the ashram) and are only allowed one day out the ashram every week.
Scattered around the ashram garden were colourful statues of the Hindu gods, and all over the walls and, especially impressive, the ceilings were detailed paintings of the animal deities.
Homo sapiens relationship with animals in this setting was one of guidance, inspiration and reassurance. They were there to tell stories; something for the residents to learn from. The guy that was giving me a tour round was from Canada and was only just beginning to learn all the different stories of the gods and goddesses. He explained how he knew which gods were which in the art, often this was due to the colour and the situation the individual was painted in; not just their form.
This trip really helped me to see the importance of religious art in giving people something to pin the stories and their own interpretations on; it gave them a point of reference and visual reminders throughout the ashram. It also bought them to life; the huge overbearing portraits bought an intensity and power to the god as if they were watching over the ashram and keeping an eye on all the people in it.
This is really good for my project as I wanted to explore animal worship by Homo sapiens in my practical work for my imagined animal project! I plan to make a little shrine for my make believe animal, this will include statues or little sculptures of the animal, candles and flowers just like the ones I have seen all over India. I want to make mine outside in a tree as well like in one of the temples I visited which was dedicated to worshipers praying for children; little home made wooden cots and material dolls hung from the branches of the tree.
In this particular temple there was also incredible amounts of visual forms of animal worship. Unfortunately for me and my project photographs were prohibited... yet this is totally understandable as it is an incredibly sacred place and even though I am not Hindu, I was completely overwhelmed by the atmosphere inside the temple. There was a cow sculpture which seemed about 3 stories high, there were individual room-like shrines for specific gods and goddesses- the sculptures in these particularly were cared for as the living; clothes, incense and flowers refreshed regularly. This showed me how 'alive' these works of art were to the worshipers. These artworks are the only tactile and physical thing to worship (apart from sacred sights like the giant 'real' footprint of a god that I saw at the golden tip of India and some may recall this as an artwork - although not worshipers!). The use of animal in the sculptures (in the gods) bought an even greater awe- we are so used to being dominant over animals, that seeing a larger than life animal sculpture with queues of Homo sapiens worshiping and praying too, and also 'donating'/paying to see was incredible and powerful. The entire temple was incredible and unlike anything I have ever witnessed before. Everything about it was designed for impact or beauty. The dark candle light in huge empty spaces was almost creepy if it hadnt been for the beautiful shrines.
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