Shiva Nataraja

Country: Spain

Manufactory: Lladro

Date of establishment: 2009

Sculptor: Joan Coderch

Size (cm): 47*44

Limited Series

Porcelain Story

I confess that in the long list of countries that I had to visit in different years, there are also those on the territory of which I spent only a few hours. Formally, as if he had visited the country. But in fact, I didn’t have time to see anything in it with my own eyes and didn’t walk along tourist or other paths. There are few such countries: Morocco, in whose capital Casablanca my colleagues and I spent half a day due to a technical malfunction of an aircraft flying to South America, Cape Verde (Cape Verde Islands), where we also spent probably six or seven hours and could not even get out of airport, because around it there were hostilities related to the ongoing civil war in the country. And India ... Great India, a trip through which is in our long-term plans, but for various reasons everything is postponed “for later”.

Formally, I was present in India. Moreover, for a short time I was even in the cockpit at the helm of the co-pilot of our Ukrainian airliner, which was landing at the largest airport in New Delhi. I then flew with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine to Indonesia, and there was a scheduled landing in the Indian capital to refuel the aircraft. Gennady Udovenko was not only a brilliant diplomat, who became famous back in Soviet times for presiding over the UN General Assembly. He was a wonderful intelligent person and an extremely sincere interlocutor. Having learned that I had never been in a cockpit in my life, Gennady Iosifovich asked the commander of the airliner to show me what was happening there and how. So, it can be said that I personally participated then in our soft landing in the Indian capital. Where we were, however, not for long. And after short negotiations, our minister and his Indian colleague went on to Indonesia...

But while our family dream of visiting India matured, a significant part of the porcelain collection was replenished with amazingly beautiful and elegant works dedicated to the culture and life of this distant and mysterious country. The composition presented to your attention is one of the most common iconographic images of a deity named Shiva Nataraja in India. The dance of Shiva symbolizes fury and strength. This dance is considered by the followers of Shiva to be insanely important for all earthly existence, because the end of the dance can mean the end of life on Earth.

In this porcelain work, judging by the descriptions of Shiva I have read, there is absolutely nothing superfluous or invented by the sculptor who created it. Each detail conveys certain meanings: an arch of lights symbolizes the suffering of the soul from constant rebirth; patronizing gesture of the upper right hand - protection from fear and ignorance ...

Shiva dances on the body of a demon lying at his feet, demonstrating the absence of fear and the struggle against ignorance and selfishness. Each hand indicates something that requires special interpretations based on deep knowledge of Indian culture and religion. Lacking such knowledge, I, of course, will not bore you with a long retelling of other people's legends. But at the same time, I cannot but once again draw your attention to the amazing detail of every plot stroke of this large and rather rare work. And the beauty of the work arouses interest and admiration.