J.J. Lally & Co., Oriental Art / New York City, New York
MenuPast Exhibition
Two Thousand Years of Chinese Sculpture
March 17-29, 2008
20.
A GROUP OF PAINTED POTTERY DANCING FIGURES
Tang Dynasty (618 - 907)
including a plump courtesan and two young men all wearing bright costumes and shown in motion, dancing with knees bent and arms extended, the courtesan with neatly coiffed black-painted hair, her wide cheeks showing traces of green-painted decoration over extensive rouge, wearing voluminous robes with long sleeves covering both hands and a flower-painted under-robe, holding one arm behind her back and the other straight out to the side while stepping one foot across the other as if in a twirling motion, the young men wearing long-tailed belted tunics painted in blue and amber over close-fitting trousers and black boots, their hair covered with knotted black headdresses decorated with dotted trellis pattern in front and with floral decoration on their trousers and at the borders of their tunics, each with one hand in a fist raised up to the chin, the other hand covered by a twisted sleeve and swinging down to one side, dancing as a pair, facing to right and left respectively in mirrored movement, all made from brick-red pottery covered with white slip and with polychrome decoration very well preserved.
Height 9 3⁄4 inches, 10 5⁄8 inches, 11 inches (24.8 cm, 27 cm and 28 cm)
Compare the group of three Tang painted pottery figures of dancing men excavated from a royal tomb discovered in the eastern suburbs of Xi’an, illustrated by Wang et. al. in Tang Jinxiang zhu mu (The Tang Tomb of Princess Jinxiang), Beijing, 2002, color plate no. 106. Princess Jinxiang was a granddaughter of Li Yuan, the first emperor of the Tang dynasty. The epitaph found in the tomb records her death in the 10th year of Tang Xuanzong (A.D. 722).
Compare also the Tang painted pottery figure of a dancing courtesan in The Palace Museum, Beijing, illustrated in the catalogue entitled Diaoshi rusheng: Gugong cang Sui Tang taoyong (As if Alive: Pottery Figures of the Sui and Tang Dynasties Collected by The Palace Museum), Beijing, 2006, p. 78, no. 24.
唐 加彩舞蹈陶俑 高 24.8 厘米、27厘米 及 28厘米
