Kali on Shiva, from a Tantric Devi Series (c. 1810): Art, History and Details

Kali on Shiva, from a Tantric Devi Series (c. 1810) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

The goddess Kali kneels in the posture reserved for wrathful deities ready for battle. In one hand she holds the sword she used to sever the demon head she triumphantly grasps in another hand. As the personification of divine energy—shakti in Sanskrit—Kali appears active, while the male principle, personified as her consort Shiva, is like a corpse (shava). The scene is set in a cremation ground, complete with vultures, jackals, and bones. Contemplation of paintings such as this assists followers in overcoming fear of death. In this image, the dead body is overlaid with the dual principles of the divine in Hindu thought: male and female, passive and active, matter and energy, white and black, Shiva and Shakti.

Object facts

• Title: Kali on Shiva, from a Tantric Devi Series
• Date: c. 1810
• Culture: Northern India, Pahari kingdoms
• Type: Painting
• Technique: gum tempera and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Sheet: 20.3 x 26 cm (8 x 10 1/4 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2014.650

A detail from the museum

This Tantric Devi painting is from a series made in the Pahari Kingdom of Mandi. CMA also has another from the same series, 2020.431.

Collection credit

Gift of Nancy and Wayne Hunnicutt

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.