The Heritage Foundation was founded to educate people about heritage, which is what the past has given us, what we value now, and what we decide to preserve for future generations.
Any creative endeavour, including heritage, can benefit from the expertise of our skilled, professional team of heritage experts. The resources, techniques, and procedures required for any historical project, no matter how big or small, are provided by our 15 years of experience in this field. The history Foundation uses a modern strategy to preserve India’s artistic and architectural history when repurposing historic structures and locations.
The significance of the Heritage Foundation can be summed up as follows
Our heritage becomes a part of who we are through helping to shape who we are. It underlines our goals and values and demonstrates to others what we value.
It offers hints about our history and the changes in our culture. It assists us to become more self-aware by allowing us to reflect on our past and cultural practises. It aids in our comprehension and explains our behaviour.
The Heritage Foundation is a pillar of our history and significantly impacts our governance, community, economy, and philosophy of life. It directly and indirectly educates, stimulates, and contributes to public opinion regarding art and architectural heritage.
Persuasion
The prime benefit of historic preservation is education, both public and private. It preserves a community’s history and makes it accessible to subsequent generations for recreational and educational purposes—simple and cheap methods for preserving archaeological and archival artifacts.
In the connected world of now, culture’s ability to influence society is obvious. Our everyday existence is enriched in innumerable ways by its many manifestations, which range from historical landmarks and museums to customs and modern art. Communities thrown off balance by perplexing change and unstable economic conditions might find identity and solidarity in their heritage. Building an open, inclusive, and pluralistic society benefits from creativity. Strong, creative, and knowledge-rich cultures are built on tradition and creativity.
Heritage & UNESCO
UNESCO and the Heritage Foundation are working together to ensure that culture is included in sustainable development strategies and processes. This includes advocating for culture and development, engaging with the international community to set policies and legal frameworks, and supporting governments and local stakeholders to safeguard heritage, strengthen creative industries and encourage cultural pluralism.
Heritage Foundation’s UNESCO-recognized cultural agreements offer a global platform for international cooperation, which also provide a comprehensive system for historical governance based on dignity and common values. These international agreements work to preserve and protect the world’s archaeological and cultural treasures, including historic ruins, underwater artefacts, museum collections, traditions passed down through generations, and another assortment of heritage, as well as to foster originality, technological advancement, and the emergence of vibrant cultural industries.
Art and Architecture
The discussion of Indian art and architecture refers to creations made on the Indian subcontinent, which is currently split between India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. The Indus River Valley produced some of the first examples of Indian art in the second half of the third millennium BC. The most well-known examples are Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa, destroyed in the nineteenth century. The Indus civilisation produced many statuettes made of steatite and limestone, square steatite seals adorned with a range of animals, ceramic storage jars with simple patterns, wheeled toys, and statues resembling mother goddesses. Few remnants of the Post-Indus Civilization through the Maurya Dynasty exist, although wooden structures were where the fundamentals of Indian architecture were created. The Maurya dynasty in India is known for its edict pillars, which are over 50 ft (15 m) high and surmounted by lotus capitals and animal figures.
Asoka’s rule is represented by the first stone ogival chaitya window discovered on the gateway of a small rock-cut temple close to Bodh Gaya. The oldest known stupas were built in the Sunga and early Andhra dynasties (first century BC). The important stupa at Sanchi shows a similar style, with relief medallions of the Buddha’s life or the jatakas (tales of his previous lives) flattened against the pillar they form part of. Early Andhra-era artwork also includes the carved railing from Bodh Gaya and the oldest surviving wall paintings. The subsequent Andhra dynasty thrived well into the first century in the far south, in the Deccan.
AD, with the Great Stupa at Amaravati being the greatest monument. Two of India’s most significant styles were created during the second and fifth centuries by the Kushans, conquerors from central Asia.
AD: Gandhara art and art of Mathura. Central and Eastern Asia benefited greatly from the influence of Gandhara art, which was influenced by Hellenistic art. Mathura produced a sculpture entirely indigenous to India with reddish limestone. The Gupta Period was a golden age of Buddhist art, with large stone figures, stone and terra-cotta reliefs, and bronzes made in the refined Gupta style. After the 7th century, significant Buddhist art was created in bronze and hard black stone from Nalanda and exhibited an evolution of the Gupta style, paying close attention to ornamental elements.
Hindu dynasties in India developed a characteristic temple plan with an entrance portico leading to a pillared hall and often crowned by a large tower known as the shikhara. The Khajuraho temples in central India and the Temple of the Sun at Konarak in S India were famous for their erotic sculptures. The Dravida-type temple was first used by the Pallava dynasty in a number of the pyramidal raths (temples) at Mahabalipuram in the seventh century. The Chola dynasty further developed this form in the 11th cent. The largest of these expanded “temple townships” is Srirangam, which represents the pinnacle of Dravida architecture. The Medieval bronze sculpture was highly developed in S India, and the skilled cire-perdue method of casting metal objects (usually bronzes) was used until the late 19th cent.
Reference list:
(2021)heritage foundation https://heritagefoundation.in/ (Accessed: 23 May 2023).
Khan, A. (2022) 75th Independence Day: 11 UNESCO Heritage Sites to visit in India, GQ India. Available at: https://www.gqindia.com/live-well/content/75th-independence-day-11-unesco-heritage-sites-to-visit-in-india (Accessed: 23 May 2023).
Kaur, S.P. (2023) 40 list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites in India of 2023 – fabhotels, FabHotels Travel Blog. Available at: https://www.fabhotels.com/blog/list-of-unesco-world-heritage-sites-in-india/ (Accessed: 23 May 2023).
