The rulers of Vijayanagara who are great patrons of art and architecture. The religious ideology gave great impetus to building activity. They combined the features of chola, Pandya, chalukya , hoyasala architectural style. Great architectural edifices were built at Hampi lepakshi , Vellore , chandragiri , Srirangam and Madurai.
Religious architecture:
Features of temples:
● walls of the temples are highly decorated with carvings and geometrical patterns
● Gopurams which are previously present on the front side now were built on all sides
● Temple pillars have a mythical creature yali (horse) engraved in them
● Monolithic pillars and enclosing walls were larger
● More than one mandapas were built in each temple. The central mandapa came to be known as kalyanamandapa
● The concept of secular buildings inside the temple premises were introduced during this time. Temple complex is enclosed by boundaries.
● Sri virupaksha temple: gopura is medieval engineering marvel
● Hazara Ramaswamy temple: hazara 1000 scenes from Ramayana decorated on the walls
● Krishna Swamy temple: there is even less of style employed in its architecture only mandappa is ornamented. The whole structure consists of principal shrine enclosed by pradakshina.
● Vittala Swami temple: mahamandapa and kalyanamandapa are impressive. Walls with high platforms, ceilings are highly ornamented . Sapta swara stamba gives music. Ferguson says finest of all temples in South India .
● Lepakshi temple: it contents three shrines of Papavinasha ,viresha , raghunatha in Trikutachala with common mandapa
● Tadipatri temple: in this two temples are there : 1 . Rama lingeshwara temple 2. Venkataramana temple, forms to large gopurams. Gopurams and mahamandapa is compared to halebid. temples at chandragiri , Kanchipuram ( one of the largest gopuram in South India) ,Srirangam ( biggest in South India with 7 enclosures) , Chidambaram are famous temples in Tamilnadu.
Courtly architecture:
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Guard tower |
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Lotus mahal |
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Elephant stable |
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Civic architecture: places of public interaction
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Ranga mandapa |
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Mahanavami Dibba |
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Temple street |
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● Beautiful mansions of the kings Sculpture:
Nandi at lepakshi
At hampi Ugra Narasimha and Hanuman sculptures
Jain architecture:
● Ganagatti temple monolithic stamba in front of the shrine built by irugappa danadanatha Jain minister of harihara-11. Paintings
● Lepakshi: paintings of Shiva thandavam , Krishna with Gopikas and Parvathi parameshwara playing , images of Vishnu avatara .
● Tadipatri: vatapatra Sai ki paintings
● Hazara Ramaswamy temple: images of Ramayana.
● Tandav siddeshwara temple: images of Shiva Purana .
● Christian paintings during venkatapathy raya-II got prominence.
Conclusion:
This period is the best and brilliant in art and architecture . the art in this period continued to rely mostly on the chalukyan tradition . later it incorporated the best traditions of tamil and kannad regions , reflecting the cosmopolitan nature of the empire . the vijayanagara sculpture is extremely excellent . thus rayas made rich cultural contribution to andhra desa.