# What is the art style of this picture of Buddha?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-art-style-of-this-picture-of-buddha/645640>\
**Category:** Cafe Society\
**Created:** [December 31, 2012, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-art-style-of-this-picture-of-buddha/645640 "2012-12-31T06:24:58Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2013, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-art-style-of-this-picture-of-buddha/645640/21 "2013-01-06T00:43:48Z")

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So **maikai** , as noted above by \*\*BrainGlutton \*\*and **tomcar** , a big exponent of that style is ISKCON, a.k.a. Hare Kṛṣṇa. Their painters are the jazzed-up ones with the airbrushes and brilliant acrylic colors that I referred to. They have churned out tons of such paintings to be printed as color plates in their tons of religious books. In particular I remember a striking portrait of Nārāyaṇa traveling throughout the universe’s stardust and galaxies on the cosmic sound waves generated by vibrating his cosmic _vīṇa_ (a stringed instrument), in one of those books they foisted on me when I was a college student. They knew full well such imagery would lure in the psychedelic rock ‘n’ roll hippie dopers of the 1970s. Their publication HQ was in California. I haven’t looked to see how much of their art is online, but there must be some. I’m not going to search for them or link to them. Personally, I don’t care for their religion, though I think their cuisine earns a gold star, especially the publications of the estimable Yamunā Devī. As for their paintings, you may wish to look them up and see for yourself.

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**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2013, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-art-style-of-this-picture-of-buddha/645640/22 "2013-01-06T00:55:44Z")

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That was Nārada, not Narayana, sorry. Nārada the cosmic musician. Missed the edit window. It’s been a very long time since I gave any thought to these matters.

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**Author:** ![maikai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/53a042/32.png) [@maikai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maikai)\
**Post date:** [January 6, 2013, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-art-style-of-this-picture-of-buddha/645640/23 "2013-01-06T20:19:22Z")

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Gold star for **Johanna**! Thank you so much for taking the time. 🙂 Knowing that it’s airbrushes acrylic is very helpful. I’m not an artist so I couldn’t tell what they were using. I don’t know what I like more, the serene Buddhist paintings or the cosmic Hare Kṛṣṇa ones. This may or may not be something I have to keep to myself.

On a side note I saw Hare Krishnas in person for the first on New Year’s Eve. They were fun! I’m an atheist but I could see how a young, impressionable person who’s seeking something could fall in with them.

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