UPSC Static Quiz – Art and Culture : 20 April 2026

Solution: C

• Option (c) is the best discriminator. Mathura Buddhas often feature jalangulikara (webbed fingers), a Mahapurusha Lakshana (sign of a great man). Gandhara artists, adhering to Greek realism, typically carved naturalistic fingers.
• In Gandhara, the hand is visible in Abhaya Mudra, though the heavy drapery is a general feature.
•  In early Mathura art (Kushan period), the Abhaya Mudra is the only mudra shown in seated images. In Gandhara, a variety of mudras (Dhyana, Dharmachakra) appear earlier.

Solution: B

• Ushnisha: A cranial bump or top-knot. In Gandhara, it is often realistic wavy hair bunched up (Greek style). In Mathura (later phases), it becomes a stylized snail-shell bump. It represents the expanded wisdom of the Buddha.
• Urna: The tuft of hair/dot between eyebrows (Option c).
• Sanghati: The robe (Option d).
• Prabhamandala: The halo (Option a).

Solution: B

• The Bala Bodhisattva is a colossal standing figure found at Sarnath but made of Mathura red sandstone.
• It bears an inscription stating it was dedicated by the Monk Bala in the 3rd year of Kanishka’s reign.
• This is crucial evidence that (1) Mathura art was exported to Sarnath (Varanasi), and (2) Iconic worship was well-established and dated to the early Kushana period.

Solution: C

• The Shungas are best remembered in art history for their architectural and sculptural additions to earlier Mauryan stupas, most notably the elaborately carved toranas at Sanchi and Bharhut. These gateways, rich in narrative reliefs and symbolic motifs, mark a major development in Buddhist art after the Mauryan period.
• The Satavahanas were the principal patrons of the Great Stupa at Amaravati, transforming it into one of the most sophisticated centres of narrative Buddhist art in the Deccan, characterised by limestone reliefs and dynamic storytelling.
• The Kushanas, ruling over north-west India, Central Asia, and parts of Afghanistan, presided over the Golden Age of Gandhara art, under which Greco-Roman artistic idioms fused with Buddhist themes to produce iconic Buddha images.
• Finally, the Ikshvakus, successors of the Satavahanas in the lower Krishna valley, made Nagarjunakonda a major Buddhist hub with monasteries, stupas, and inscriptions, giving it pan-Asian religious importance.

Solution: A

• The Amaravati School of Art is frequently termed the “Vengi School” because its geographical and cultural roots lie in the ancient Vengi region of the eastern Deccan. This region broadly corresponds to the fertile tract between the Krishna and Godavari rivers, an area that emerged as a major Buddhist and artistic heartland from around the 2nd century BCE onwards.
• The flourishing of monumental stupas such as Amaravati and Nagarjunakonda, along with a shared stylistic vocabulary—dynamic movement, elaborate narrative reliefs, and refined limestone carving—gives the school a strong regional identity.
• Art historians therefore use the term “Vengi School” not as a casual label but as a precise geographical-cultural classification.
• Since the name directly derives from the region of its development, the reason logically and historically explains why the Amaravati tradition is also known as the Vengi School.