India > Museums > The Government Museum, Thiruvananthapuram

The Government Museum, Thiruvananthapuram

This museum was founded in 1857. The area around it has been laid out as a park and zoological garden. The museum has a fine collection in its natural history section. The art collection covers aspects of Kerala's rich heritage in sculptures of stone, wood and metal. The gallery of bronze shows the marked style of Kerala as quite clearly distinct from that of the bronzes of Tamil Nadu where, under the Cholas, bronzes tended to be tall and almost unnaturally slim.

Vishnu Srinivasa (ninth century, Kerala) is one of the oldest pieces in this museum. Later figures of Natarja, various devis and others follow in the same style, with conspicuous jewellery and other elegant details.

Wood sculptures for the adornment of temples are slightly different in plan and design from other temples in India. The plan is often circular for the main shrine, and wooden beams, pillar brackets and tiled roofs are favoured in the wet tropical climate of Kerala. Wood was also used to make huge carved chariots for temple processions, too convey carrying in the museum are richly carved with sculpture and decorative motifs. Kerala still produces some of India's most valuable and handsome wood for carved furniture and sculpture.