A Painted and Gilded Pottery Figure of a Foreign Dancer

TANG DYNASTY, 7TH-8TH CENTURY

Details

A Painted and Gilded Pottery Figure of a Foreign Dancer
Tang dynasty, 7th-8th century
The curly-haired young foreigner shown in the movement of a dance, wearing a red dhoti wrapped around his hips and a long scarf draped over his shoulders and hips and criss-crossed in back, his necklace, bangles and anklets gilded, with traces of black, grey, white and green pigment
13 3/8in. (34cm.) high, brocade stand
Falk Collection no. 32.

Provenance

Mathias Komor, New York, May 1945.

Exhibited

On loan: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1965, (L65.46.15).
Foreigners in Ancient Chinese Art, New York, China House Gallery, China Institute in America, 1969, no. 34.
Ming-Ch'i, Clay Figures Reflecting Life in Ancient China, Katonah, New York, Katonah Art Gallery, 1975.

Lot Essay

A figure of this type illustrated by E. Schloss, Ancient Chinese Ceramic Sculpture, Stamford, Connecticut, 1977, vol. I, p. 107, fig. 13, is described by the author as Indian. The dark grey (once black) pigment that remains on the bare-skinned areas of the present figure indicates that the dancer was dark skinned, and therefore would have been considered one of the 'kunlun' peoples, a term used for anyone with dark skin; ie. someone from 'south of the Kunlun mountains'. This dancer, with his Caucasian features could have represented someone from north India, Afghanistan, Gandhara or Hadda, and like the other figures of foreigners made during the Tang dynasty, represented the cosmopolitan nature of the period.

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