Page 104 - Bonhams March 22 2022 Indian and Himalayan Art NYC

The Ramayana

The story of Rama, best known in its iteration as Valmiki’s Ramayana, has played a significant
role in the art, history, and politics of South and Southeast Asian civilizations. There are
hundreds—if not thousands—of versions, with local adaptations in poetry and prose,
painting and sculpture, and drama and dance, each one illustrative of its own time and place.
Underpinning the story’s popularity is its political use by rulers of several dynasties, who sought
to embody the restoration of religious values carried within the text.

While the story of Rama as an oral tradition is suspected to have arrived in Burma (Myanmar)
with Indian settlers to the Pyu city-states of the first millennium, its earliest physical record is
Rama’s depiction on 11th-century plaques from Pagan illustrating the Jataka tales. In Burma,
the Rama story traverses Hindu, Buddhist, and royal contexts with considerable fluidity. Rama
is recognized simultaneously as an avatar of the Hindu God Vishnu, as a previous incarnation of
the Buddha, and as the “Palace Rama”, embodying righteous kingship (Kaung, “The Ramayana
Drama in Myanmar”, in Journal of the Siam Society, 90.1 & 2, 2002, pp.1237-48).
Several literary versions were composed from the 17th century onward, and the popularity
of Ramayana literature reached its zenith in the 19th century. In the late 18th century, the
Konbaung dynasty imported and began adapting the Thai court dance-drama—known in
Burma as the Yodaya Yama [Ayutthaya Rama]—after bringing back Thai dancers and musicians
from the sacking of Ayutthaya in 1767. The many subsequent performances of the Rama story
at the royal theater contributed significantly to the cultural renaissance that Burma underwent
during the formative years of the Silver Age (c.1850-1930).
The many mediums in which the Rama story was retold, performed, and visually translated
carried their legacies onto Burmese silver. This variety stands in notable contrast to the relative
uniformity in depictions of the Jataka tales as didactic retellings of Pali canonical literature.
Offering bowls clearly informed by literary versions, including Valmiki’s Ramayana, would
have been appropriate for donations to both Buddhist and Hindu temples. Like the jatakas,
the story would have had the appeal of reinforcing traditional values within immigrant Indian
households, which formed a significant part of the nouveau riche during the Silver Age. At other
times, the showcasing of traditional architecture and complex narrative registers demonstrates
a silversmith’s familiarity with pictorial renderings of the Rama story in painted murals and
illustrated manuscripts (parabaiks), which also commonly serve as merit-generating donations
in Theravada Buddhism. Yet perhaps the dramatic performance of the Ramayana had the most
prevalent influence on Burmese silver, giving rise to frequent depictions of figural choreography
and Konbaung attire in narrative scenes, and to pieces encapsulating the story with a limited
cast of key characters. If one looks closely, visual hints from these various iterations of the
Ramayana can be discerned in the best pieces of Burmese silver.

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