TWO SANCAI-GLAZED BUFF POTTERY EQUESTRIAN FIGURES

TANG DYNASTY

Details

TWO SANCAI-GLAZED BUFF POTTERY EQUESTRIAN FIGURES
Tang Dynasty
One modeled as a foreigner, the other a courtier, each horse standing foursquare on a rectangular base with the head turned slightly to the left, the foreigner with an unglazed face detailed in black and red pigment with a beard and long moustache and wearing a tunic with broad lapels, the courtier with an unglazed head, wearing a high headress and green tunic, each holding his arms as if reining back his horse, one horse glazed amber, the other splash-glazed in green, amber and straw
15¼in. (38.8cm.) high (2)

Literature

Bearded equestrian: The Tsui Museum of Art, Chinese Ceramics I: Neolithic to Liao, Hong Kong, 1993, no. 95 (far left)

Exhibited

Bearded equestrian: Aarhus, Denmark, Aarhus Kunstmuseum, Empire of the Dragons, Chinese Art Treasures Through 4000 Years from Hong Kong, Sweden and Denmark, 1995, no. 36 (one of a group of seven equestrian figures)

Lot Essay

Compare the bearded Western Asian rider in the Dr. and Mrs. Howard Balensweig Collection included in the exhibition, Foreigners in Ancient Chinese Art, China House Gallery, March 27 - May 25, 1969, Catalogue, no. 43 and another in the exhibition, The Silk Road, Treasures of Tang China, The Empress Place Museum, Singapore, 1991, Catalogue, p. 31

The result of Oxford Authentication Ltd. thermoluminescence test no. C97c78 is consistent with the dating of this lot