Object Number: VRM10136

Dimensions: 53.5 x 28.0 cm

Material: Clay

Find Location: Raninagar, Naogaon District, Bangladesh

Date: 5th-6th Century CE

This is an exceptionally rare masterpiece, that reflects the outstanding skill and craft that created this image of Vishnu. It is likely to have been the masterpiece created to produce metal sculptures through the lost-wax casting technique. In this process, the original sculpture is made of clay – the masterpiece – and then a secondary mould is formed by pressing clay onto it to make a negative. The masterpiece is now removed and can be used again or discarded. The interior surface of this new mould is now coated with wax. The central void is then packed with core material, often clay. The composite mould is then heated so that the wax runs out, leaving a void into which molten metal, usually bronze, is then poured to cast the final sculpture.

The identification of this object as a masterpiece is prompted by the fact that it is made of sun-dried clay and has not been fired into terracotta. Survival of a clay masterpiece is highly unusual and is direct evidence for many of the stages of production that are usually lost to archaeology.

The creation of clay masterpieces is both an artform and ritual process, and is still practiced in Bangladesh. During the Durga Puja, clay sculptures of deities are constructed, using bamboo frames padded with straw. These images are then hand-painted, clothed and worshipped. At the culmination of the festival, the clay sculptures are ceremonially immersed in water and returned to their constituent elements.