Bharat Kala Bhavan, Banaras Hindu University (BHU), Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
Hiranyagarbha "The Golden Cosmic Egg" c. 1740, by Manaku (c. 1700-1760). This is a sparse but cerebrally complex folio, painted in opaque watercolour and gold on paper, belonging to an unpublished series for the Bhagvata Purana (Bhgavata Pura), in the Bharat Kala Bhavan, BHU, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India.
Here the 'cosmic egg' itself is one huge, glowing gold ovoid floating against a deep, cold ground, the contours of which expand outward like water or space, or circles of time. Its surface is dappled with warm golds and browns, hinting at both the density of matter and an intrinsic luminosity. This use of abstract ambiguous composition is indeed quite unusual for narrative painting: rather than depicting gods, mythological figures or ancient architecture; Manaku chose to present a profound idea.
His starting point is the Vedic-Puranic concept of Hiranyagarbha ('golden womb'/'egg'), the cosmic primal germ of existence. In the cosmological passages of the Bhagvata Purana the cosmos originates as a formless expanse prior to the coming into being of the distinct ordered universe; Manaku captures that metaphysics in painting: the egg clearly presents the concept of potentiality while the patterned field suggests the formless immensity out of which form arises.
The work fits into the Guler/Pahari painting context, a Himalayan hill school, where atelier artists would produce intimately scaled paintings on manuscript format for select collectors; these were pictures intended to be appreciated in a small, quiet space. On that level Hiranyagarbha represents a philosophical declaration painted in color: the genesis of the universe is not simply read or listened to, it is seen and contemplated. We are asked to partake of the moment before the start of narrative, when the cosmos exists only as an idea within a solitary shining form.
The work is steeped in modern mysticism and symbolic abstraction. At its center is a large textured golden oval, a powerful motif that represents the “Cosmic Egg” or Hiranyagarbha, the primordial source of life and creation in the traditional sense. This bright being is surrounded by a dark slate blue background with intricate concentric white ripples. These wavy lines recall the look of topographical maps or the patterns of fluid waves, giving a sense of cosmic vibration made tangible. Ultimately, the work succeeds in perfectly juxtaposing raw, primitive symbolism with abstract expressionism, creating a dense focus of energy that explodes outward into the vast, flowing universe.
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By: Sesil Kavrak
That's what really grabs me in this painting, that it shows the moment before there's anything yet, but there is already a restraint. Most religious art seeks to present to you a god, a battle, a miracle; something happening. Manaku, on the contrary, paints the moment immediately prior to all that being possible, and somehow makes that emptiness the most gripping image in the entire cycle. It's an artful bravery that goes into that decision: trusting that a bright form against that dark space will keep the viewer's eye just as long as a busy mythological landscape will.
My interpretation of the golden egg is a reflection on the idea of possibility, not power. It is not fighting, it is not blessing, it is not creating in any visible sense, and yet the whole universe is contained in it and waits. It's a subtle message on beginnings of all kinds: the most important moment in any process, cosmic or otherwise, may be the one before form, rather than the one after. It seems to mean, in its mottled gold and brown surface, both density, and light at the same time, as if it argued that the matter and the consciousness are not two distinct things arriving in succession, one after another, but are already fused together in the first shining germ, and indistinguishable from each other.
But there is something in the size of the object as well. This is a small page of a manuscript (a book of handwritten text) meant to be held close to the eyes, and not intended for viewing by a mob in a temple, like a mural intended for public viewing. As an idea this grand, the source of all things, Manaku appears to know that intimacy is the best approach, rather than spectacle. You don't shout the first word of the universe, you sit with it like you would sit with a private thought. To me the actual significance of this is the painting itself, it's not just an illustration of a cosmological concept; it's the experience of pondering a cosmological concept, alone, silent, quietly illuminated.
