The Himmapan Animal to the Creation of Contemporary Thai Painting

Abstract

This research articles is a creative study of art with three objectives: 1) to study the history, importance and types of Himavanta creatures in Buddhism, 2) to study and analyze the patterns of Himavanta creatures in the Thai Black Book in the reign of King Rama III, and the works of contemporary artists, 3) to create contemporary Thai painting by using Himavanta creatures reflecting the Buddhist concept of the Four Primary Elements.  It is creative art research by studying documents and research results that lead to the creation of Thai works.

The followings are its results. 1) Himavanta creatures denote special creatures those dwell in the Himavanta forest. They have mixed appearance between a human and a creature, a creature mixed with creature and as a non-mixed natural creature. They were imaged up mainly to show the story of the creation of Mount Meru based on the concept of the Three Realms of Existence. 2) Himavanta creatures in the Thai Black Book during the reign of King Rama III, were just written sketches purposively to imply on the Royal Crematorium, and  there are also limitations on choosing the kinds of creature. That is to say, there are 77 species with the same posture. On each creatureís back a Bussabok (the movable throne) on which the gifts to offer to the monks were arranged. On the other hands,  the Himavanta creatures having created by contemporary artists, are composed of the  Western art-style realistic muscle anatomy, additionally, Thai painting patterns and Eastern arts were mixed in an ideal format. 3) The creation of 15 contemporary Thai paintings is result of synthetic knowledge about the studied Himavanta creatures. It was the inspiration for a creativity. From this it implies the combined form of a human and Himavanta creature. This is a prominent creation differed from the past creations of Himavanta creatures.   The researcher, therefore, has chosen to utilize the Benjarong Color (the groups of 5 colors) to create a work that ideally combined both Western and Eastern arts. By this creativity, it will represent of the Dhammaís concept of the Four Primary Elements.