Thyagaraja Temple, Tiruvarur
— — a temple tank wide enough to hold the sky.
Not only on a wall.
“A vast Shiva temple in the old delta town of Tiruvarur, with one of the largest temple tanks in India and a chariot heavy enough to need a thousand hands on the rope. The deity here is Thyagaraja, the same name the great Carnatic composer carried into the south. Old stone, slow water, a town that has been a music town for centuries. — from the studio
Thyagaraja Temple, Tiruvarur, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
The Thyagaraja Temple sits in the heart of old Tiruvarur, in the Cauvery delta of Tamil Nadu, about 55 kilometres east of Thanjavur. The complex is dedicated to the Thyagaraja form of Shiva and is one of the Saptha Vidanga Sthalams, a group of seven temples in the delta linked by a single Vaishnavite legend. The site has been a centre of Shaiva worship since at least the Chola period, with inscriptions and structures spanning the 9th through 13th centuries.
The Kamalalayam tank covers roughly 25 acres beside the temple and is among the largest temple tanks in India. The main gopuram rises in tiers of carved stone above the surrounding town, and the inner prakaram preserves Chola bronzes and granite mandapams added across successive dynasties. The temple chariot used in the Panguni festival is one of the heaviest in Asia, drawn through the four streets that frame the complex.
Tiruvarur is the birthplace of Tyagaraja, the 18th-century composer whose kritis form a foundation of Carnatic music. His connection to the town and to the temple deity gives the place a double weight, religious and musical, that other South Indian temple towns rarely carry. The Panguni Uthiram chariot festival in March or April brings the largest crowds of the year, with the great wooden ther pulled through the surrounding streets.