GOLDEN DOORWAY
RESTORATION: MAY 2012 - DECEMBER 2012FUNDED BY:
THE GOVERNMENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
SUMITOMO FOUNDATION
The Golden Doorway marks the entry to the Taleju shrine located inside the south wing of Mulchowk. The ensemble consists of three gilt repousse components: a door, a torana (tympanum), and two life-size sculptures of the river deities Ganga and Yamuna. Continual renewal over the centuries has produced a layering of elements, making it difficult to precisely date the ensemble. To completely re-gild the ensemble would be to obscure evidence of its devotional history, but to preserve a damaged and incomplete ruin would be just as unacceptable. Given the local custom of periodically rebuilding religious shrines, it was deemed necessary to repair and re-gild certain damaged elements. A technique was devised to create a matching patina so that the newly gilt copper would not be incongruent with the worn, heavy patina of the original.
Since each of the 12 figurines attached to the tympanum were stolen in the 1970s and have since been lost to the international art market, KVPT commissioned and installed replicas based on a photograph by Mary Slusser taken in 1968. Draftsmen drew detailed to-scale drawings of each figurine, which were given to three different groups of local metallurgists and craftsmen. One group of metal craftsmen - Rajan Shakya, Phalsaman Shakya, and Bijaya Ratna Shakya - generously donated the new figurines, which they produced using the traditional lost-wax casting process.
