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Lot Essay
This stately, elegant figure exemplifies the ideal standards of beauty and fashion that prevailed during the high Tang period of the 8th century in China. During this period, a more voluptuous body type had become fashionable, which was reflected in women's robes being long and loose-fitting, and their hair was worn in fuller hair styles that framed the face. Other painted pottery figures representing this type of court lady are illustrated in The Quest for Eternity - Chinese Ceramic Sculpture from the People's Republic of China, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, 1987, pp. 139-40, nos. 83-84, and col. pl., p. 56. Several paintings on silk, from Turfan, of women that are similar in type to the present figure, depict them with pink cheeks, to indicate the use of rouge, which is seen on the full cheeks of the present figure. See The Ancient Art in Xinjiang, China, 1994, pp. 86-7, pls. 210, 213 and 215. And the hairdo of the present figure is very similar to that of a court lady of similar type painted on a Tang dynasty (784) mural at Wangjiafen, Xian, illustrated by P. Karetsky in Court Art of the Tang, Maryland, 1996, p. 274.