Most Indian sculpture is religious, the expression of the divine in visible form. The Chandella artists who sculpted this majestic sandstone image of Vishnu, one of the most powerful and popular gods in the Hindu pantheon and the preserver of universal order, were supreme workers of stone in medieval India. Vishnu is attended on either side by his avatars or incarnations, including the boar-headed Vahara and the man-lion Narasimha. Lesser attendants and narrative detail fill the rest of the skilfully carved surface, stepped back in four planes. As usual, Vishnu is depicted standing in a full frontal pose, wearing the crown of the warrior aristocracy and with the sacred thread looped across his bare chest. In three of his four arms he holds one of his principal attributes: the mace ('gada'), discus ('chakra') and conch ('sankha'). Sometimes his fourth hand carries a lotus ('padma') but in this example his fourth hand is held in the symbolic gesture ('mudra') of boon-granting ('varada'). His bolt-upright stance identifies him with the axis of the universe, while his vertical emphasis leads the worshipper's eye upwards to the divine.

'Asian Art', AGNSW Collections, 1994, pg. 176.