Ganesha (c. 1070): Art, History and Details

Ganesha (c. 1070) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Ganesha, the god of wealth and abundance, is an auspicious and revered Hindu deity. He removes obstacles and protects his worshipers. Numerous myths explain how Ganesha became an elephant-man composite, but the most popular version relates the story of how he was decapitated by his enraged father, Shiva, and restored to life through the intervention of his mother, Parvati. Shiva agreed to revive him with the head of the first creature encountered: an elephant. Ganesha's strength—his profound spiritual wisdom—contrasts with his weakness for sweets, as indicated by his pudginess and the sweet modaka he carries. In Ganesha, opposing forces exist in perfect harmony.

Object facts

• Title: Ganesha
• Date: c. 1070
• Culture: South India, Medieval period, Chola dynasty(10th-13th century)
• Type: Sculpture
• Technique: bronze
• Dimensions: Overall: 50.8 x 25.4 x 17.8 cm (20 x 10 x 7 in.); Base: 23 x 18.3 cm (9 1/16 x 7 3/16 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 1970.62

A detail from the museum

Ganesha pulls his own broken tusk in one hand, which he used as a pen to write the epic Mahabharata.

Collection credit

Gift of Katharine Holden Thayer

Further reading listed by the museum

• "Art of Asia Recently Acquired by American Museums, 1970." Archives of Asian Art 25 (1971): 91–120.
• The Cleveland Museum of Art. Handbook of the Cleveland Museum of Art/1978. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1978.
• Wallbank, T. Walter, A.M. Taylor, and N.M. Bailkey. Civilization Past & Present. Glenview, IL: Scott, Foreseman, 1981.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.