‘Icons are codified visual messages’
| Date :28-May-2019 |
Dr Ramaa Golwalkar
By Kartik Lokhande:
The miniatures of beautiful famous idols from Indian iconography adorning the table, books on ‘Murtishastra’ peeping out of bookshelf, novels and books on symbololgy, a neat row of volumes of ‘Bharatiya Samskrutikosh’, and several documents jostling for space with the computer set on table, a painting of Raja Ravivarma and a portrait of Lord Krishna in ‘Padmaasan’ with a serene smile on face catch the attention of a visitor, as one enters the study of Dr Ramaa Golwalkar. Of course, one more thing that welcomes the visitor is the enthusiasm of Dr Ramaa Golwalkar herself.
From the appearance of her study, one can guess that she is a master in iconography, especially dealing with Indian icons. Obviously, then, a conversation that starts with a question about what triggered her pursuit of knowledge in this domain, flows through the time seamlessly. Dr Ramaa Golwalkar goes back in time to the days, when she wanted to do PhD in Mass Communication and worked on a topic about communication in Vedic period. Later, she moved to Pune where she took up another subject and completed her PhD on impact of cellphone usage on behavioural pattern of under-graduate students. Still, the idea of exploring in-depth the previous topic of Mass Communication in Vedic period, made her restless.
“As I started reading on the topic, visiting places, and thinking deeper on the subject, I realised that Western concept of Mass Communication was relatively new. It centred around political identity, technology, and its impact on humans. But, our own Indian concept dated back to several centuries ago and it dealt with cultural identity and ethos,” says the scholar, who is also a Member of Central Board for Film Certification. She pursued her interest and did MA in Indology from Tilak Maharashtra University. According Dr Golwalkar who is well-versed with multiple languages including Samskrit, Marathi, Hindi, Urdu, and English, Indian civilisation was the largest among others in the world.
“As many as 1,160 excavations have been done in India and big cities have been found buried in history. Indian history has a unique way of binding people in common cultural history. Despite this, when I came across false claims about Indian civilisation, I strongly felt that there had to be a systematic study,” she adds. On the basis of her study of ancient scriptures, carvings, murals, temple architecture, idols, signs, symbols, and icons, Dr Ramaa Golwalkar draws a conclusion that Indian culture has been an icon-driven one. She elaborates, “Icons are codified visual messages for masses. They are tools of visual communication that are more inclusive, comprehensive, and elaborative than verbal communication. And, they are also open to interpretation.” The messages codified in icons relate to Science, rules of Nature, Life. They shed light on philosophy, beauty, physics, chemistry, literature, astronomy and what not. They present a logic to satisfy intellect, and spirituality to please soul.
The element of spirituality is more important in all-round development of an individual, a society, and a civilisation. The concept of modern-day development revolves around physical, mental, and material development. However, the Indian concept has always been about physical, mental, intellectual, and spiritual development. This concept has been expressed in varied ways. Dr Golwalkar explains her point with the help of an interesting example. “In our childhood, our grandmother told us that ‘Sheshnaag’ balanced Earth on its hood. For a modern-day Science student, it is a wild and unscientific idea. However, when one decodes the symbolism, one finds it logical,” she says. She then decodes the symbolism. According to her, this symbolism explains the time and space relationship. ‘Sheshnaag’ represents time, and its oscillation is akin to ‘sine wave’ or ‘sinusoidal waveform’ used in signal processing, engineering, physics, and applied mathematics.
The rhythmic movement of the hood represents up and down in time. Also, as one knows, a snake does not chew, it swallows. Similarly, time represented by ‘Sheshnaag’ and its movements swallows things into history. Just as a snake sheds old skin and gets fresh skin, time also is not static. Time evolves, renews itself. However, one does not know when does one time end and another begin. Hence, it is infinite. Something not known to one is infinite. In Indian scriptures, there is idea of Earth riding the hood of ‘Anant (infinite) Shesh’. “Isn’t it wonderful to know that our common ancestors knew these concepts?” asks Dr Golwalkar. Instantly, she replies to her question, “The only thing is that the ancestors of Indians had the habit of recording their understanding of the Universe in signs, symbols, and icons. Unfortunately, as we received modern education, we did not pay attention to our own rich culture.” It is only now, she feels, Indians have started rediscovering how scientifically developed were the ancestors. In fact, the Western countries realised many facets of rich ancient Indian culture.
For instance, Fritjof Capra drew parallel between Lord Shiva’s form ‘Nataraja’ and the movement of sub-atomic particles. Once, he mentioned, “Hundreds of years ago, Indian artists created visual images of dancing Shivas in a beautiful series of bronzes. In our time, physicists have used the most advanced technology to portray the patterns of the cosmic dance. The metaphor of the cosmic dance thus unifies ancient mythology, religious art and modern physics.” One can go on quoting several examples of such metaphors in icons, images, sculptures, murals, reliefs in carvings etc. From communication point of view, Dr Ramaa Golwalkar says, there are two types of media: time-based and space-based. Rock is a time-based and durable medium.
Carvings, scriptures, and sculptures on it are space-based media. As far as temples are concerned, there are specific ways of construction in which symbology has been incorporated, she observes. In ancient times, temples were places of not only worship but also congregation, economic activity, social assimilation, and where classical performance arts evolved, says Dr Golwalkar, who also writes a popular column on Indian icons in a Marathi daily and also writes a blog on the topic. Any good interaction can go on and on, when it has aesthetics of a good thought, and messages delivered in a demystified manner. It is just like a beautiful carving on the plaque of time. It has to be completed at one point, so that it can find its place in the memory, and also grant an opportunity to revisit it in future. So, the conversation with Dr Ramaa Golwalkar stops... at the point when the readers start thinking over it and start looking at icons from a different perspective.