Gesture as Philosophy

Across mediums, Dr Gnana’s figures speak less through facial detail than through gesture. A bowed head signals reverence; an elongated arm curves protectively around a child; Krishna’s tilted body leaning into the flute captures sound as movement. His sculptures invite slow viewing: the eye travels along arcs rather than edges, following the flow of one form into another. Gesture becomes a kind of language of the soul. This work with bronze is a reminder that gesture carries memory, intimacy, and spirituality. 

Taking from art history, the Chola bronzes created between the 10th and the 13th centuries CE, occupy a philosophical domain wherein the divine is often revealed through the grace of posture rather than facial expression. The figures in cosmic dance, or of Krishna inclined and leaning on the flute, were to be read in certain curvature, suspension of weight, and implied continuity of movement. Therefore, this can be considered as less of a representation and more of a metaphysical statement articulating that the body is a site for carving out energy. Similarly, a parallel can be drawn to the Greek concept rhythmos, an idea stating form can never be fixed; it is rather moulded by the flow and interval of movement it embraces. Both concepts thereby imply that a gesture may hold a thought through a subtle tilt of the neck, a bowed head, a curved spine, gestures that shelter more than holding. With Dr Gnana’s bronzes, the lineage continues: these gestures do not simply situate or describe a figure but rather propose a mode of apprehension of the world — gesture as being and philosophy itself.