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Oct 30, 2012

Gateway Bracket

AD 150–200

India, Mathura, Kushan period

(AD 1-320)

Sandstone

Overall: 73.9 x 57.2 cm (29 1/8 x 22 1/2 in.)

John L. Severance Fund 1971.15

Location

242A Ancient India

Description

Gateways leading into a sacred area often had large horizontal architraves, the weight of which was supported by brackets carved with figures of voluptuous women grasping the branch of a tree. They embody the ideal form of the young mother, with breasts full of nourishing milk. As personifications of the sap that pervades living plants, they are auspicious markers of life and abundance. These attractive figures, who embody the purifying water essential for life, symbolically cleanse visitors as they enter the sacred space. On both sides of this large bracket they grasp the branch of an ashoka tree, which has clusters of flowers that are bright red in nature.

Video

Provenance

?–1971

(William H. Wolff [1906-1991], New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)

1971–

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Fricke, Berthold. The Cleveland Museum of Art. Hannover: Knorr & Hirth, 1970. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 89

Lee, Sherman E. "The Year in Review for 1971." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 59, no. 1 (1972): 3-46. Mentioned: no. 180, p. 47; p. 4; Reproduced: no. 180, p. 24 www.jstor.org

Czuma, Stanislaw. “Mathura Sculpture in the Cleveland Museum Collection.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art, vol. 64, no. 3, 1977, pp. 83–114. Mentioned and Reproduced: Cover and frontispiece; pp. 82-83; p. 93, figs. 18 and 19; p. 94, fig. 20 www.jstor.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978. Reproduced: p. 289 archive.org

Czuma, Stanislaw J., and Rekha Morris. Kushan Sculpture: Images from Early India. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art in cooperation with Indiana University Press, 1985. Mentioned and Reproduced: cat. no. 35, p. 99

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1991. Reproduced: p. 15 archive.org

Cunningham, Michael R., Stanislaw J. Czuma, Anne E. Wardwell, and J. Keith Wilson. Masterworks of Asian Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1998. Mentioned and Reproduced: pp. 120-121

Morris, Rekha, "Sense and Sensitivity: Sherman Lee's Impact on the Collection of North Indian Sculpture at the Cleveland Museum of Art," Orientations, vol. 36, no.1, pp. 88-93. Mentioned and Reproduced: p. 89

Exhibition history

Materials of the Artist. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 4-December 12, 1958).

Kushan Sculpture: Images from Early India. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 13, 1985-January 5, 1986).

Buddha in India. Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien (organizer) (April 2-July 16, 1995).

Cite this page

{{cite web|title=Gateway Bracket|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1971.15|year=AD 150–200|access-date=29 November 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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Gateway Bracket

Gateway Bracket

India, Mathura, Kushan period

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