STORIES FROM UCSD

Masters of Fire

It is a rare glimpse into a culture of craftsmen who trace their work and bloodlines back nearly 1,000 years.

“Masters of Fire: Hereditary Bronze Casters of South India,” is the new exhibition at Geisel Library, curated by Tom Levy, professor of archaeology, and based on his research in the town of Swamimalai in the south Indian state of Tamil Nadu. For centuries Swamimalai has been the center of bronze Hindu icon manufacturing in the region, with its workshops passed down from generation to generation of hereditary sthapathis (‘artisans’ in the Tamil language).

Levy, who holds the Norma Kershaw Endowed Chair in the Archaeology of Ancient Israel and the Neighboring Lands, is an associate director of UCSD’s Center of Interdisciplinary Science for Art, Architecture and Archaeology (CISA3), which produced the exhibition.

“This exhibition looks at this ancient culture and society through the lens of one family-owned workshop that can trace its craft back at least 10 generations,” says Levy, whose book, also called Masters of Fire, is published by the German Mining Press. “I’m especially proud that three of my co-authors on that book are the three brothers who
now run the workshop.”

The exhibition shows how artisans first carve a wax statue, next bake it in fine clay from the Kaveri River delta, then pour out the wax, replacing it with molten metal. “Called the lost-wax technique, it’s how the best bronze statues of Hindu gods are made in Swamimalai still today,” says Levy. “And there are close parallels to the way we believe craftsmen produced high-end metal objects during the early Copper Age in the Holy Land.”

The exhibition, which is free and open to the public, runs through January 25, 2009.

—Doug Ramsey