A SANCAI-GLAZED POTTERY FIGURE OF AN EQUESTRIENNE

Details

A SANCAI-GLAZED POTTERY FIGURE OF AN EQUESTRIENNE
TANG DYNASTY (618-907)

The pottery lady modelled with a rounded face, her hair tied up in an elaborated twirled chignon, dressed in a riding tunic with tight sleeves and wearing boots, turned to one side with both hands clenched as if holding onto the reins at waist level, seated on a saddled and harnessed horse, the horse standing four-square with its head turned to one side, decorated with a glaze of amber and green tones, the mane of the horse detailed in a brown glaze falling in streaks onto the cream glaze body (restored)
16 1/2 in. (41.8 cm.) high, box

Provenance

Manno Art Museum, no. 446

Literature

Selected Masterpieces of the Manno Collection, Japan, 1988, pl. 88

Lot Essay

Sancai-glazed female riders of this type are unusual though not unknown. Compare with similar figures wearing long coats with wide lapels and elaborate top knots, such as the example sold in our Los Angeles Rooms, 4 December 1998, lot 23; the figure sold in London, 9 June 1987, lot 66, which may be the example illustrated by R.L. Hobson, The Eumorfopoulos Collection, London, 1925, Catalogue, vol. 1, pl. XXIX, no. 290; and two other riders, one female, most likely from the same tomb illustrated, ibid., pl. XXIX, nos. 288 and 289.

For a discussion on the depiction of women on horseback, see Virginia Bower, "Two Masterworks of Tang Ceramic Sculpture", Orientations, June, 1993, pp. 75-77, where various examples are illustrated.

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