Art of control

A recent encounter with the image of the Trojan priest Laocoon and his sons being strangled by sea snakes at Stockholm's National Museum brought back long forgotten memories.

Your columnist recalled flipping through a small book devoted to the statue in his father's library. As a child, he found the close-ups pretty macabre, but remembered his grandfather extolling the sculpture which many Renaissance masters, including Michelangelo and Titian, regarded as being the greatest of all masterpieces produced by Western tradition.

Laocoon also inspired vigorous debate, particularly on the aesthetics of pain and violence . This was the theme of 'Passions, Five Centuries of Art and Emotions' expo in Stockholm.

"The Laocoon group became a vital part of the aesthetic debate in the 18th century where matters of beauty, suffering and the boundaries of art were discussed ," says the catalogue.

For all his suffering, Laocoon does not scream, those favouring classical restraint pointed out. Of course his face is contorted but his mouth is almost closed in stoic forbearance.

This led them to the 'supreme law of visual arts' which forbids literal depiction of extreme violence because it would only disgust and repel the viewer who would thus lose the cathartic benefits of a moral lesson. The literal was the enemy of art, the classicists argued.

This resonates well with Bharata Muni's canonical Natya-Shastra endorsed by masters like Sri Abhinavagupta : Only real art touches the soul. But that needs utmost spiritual restraint.