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A Note to the English Version
Shri Vasudeo Smart was an accomplished artist and ardent connoisseur of the extremely rich traditions of ancient Indian art and culture. Throughout his life, he cherished an unbound admiration for the temple architecture, pat paintings and murals of ancient India. His thoughts and perceptions were those of an artist. When he looked at something, for example a painting, he looked at it not as an art crtic or a historian of art. Though he did write a number of articles and quite a few books, language was never his medium of expression and its written from never his principal forte.
The Gujarati version of this monograph, as he had originaly penned, was no more than rambling notes in margins, much in the nature of an initial sketch that could be developed into a full-fledged and finished copy of the original at a later and more convinient time. The learned editor of the Gujarati version has tried his best to recast the original draft so as to give it the semblance of a monograph. The main thrust of what Shri Vasudeo Smart wrote was to point out certain beauties and excellences to us as if we too were standing side by side with him and eying those marvells of Jain art with admiration and awe. At times he seems to have been carried away by this or that fascinating detail regarding the places he had visited or the artifacts that had enthralled him. But he aimed at conveying to us the vibrancy and force of the immediacy of an esthetic experience.
The very nature of the monograph, then, calls for not a verbatim translation but a very free rendering. At times one needs to read between the lines to have a glimpse of the spirit informing his writing. And this is exactly what I have tried to do in the pages that follow.
The work has been a race with time and a race against odds. But His Holiness Shri Vijay Shilchandrasuriji has been a great source inspiration and guidence. Jagdeep Smart kept constantly goading me into action and came up with many clarifications I needed. My dear friends Dr. Shirish Panchal and Jaydev Shukla, my wife Niranjana, my son Eugine and my daughter Purvi have always stood by me with love and affection in all that I have done as also in all that I have failed to do.
December, 31, 2001, Chhota Udepur.
Sanat Bhatt
12 : Jain Kashthapat Chitra
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