PORTRAIT OF EMPRESS DOWAGER CIXI AS GUANYIN

Based on the close and frequent contacts Reverend Headland and his wife had with the Qing court, he wrote the informative Court Life in China. In this book, he reported that this painting of the Empress Dowager Cixi depicted in the guise of Guanyin, the Goddess of Mercy was painted by "one of the leading portrait painters of Peking" and that this guise was one that the Empress Dowager "delighted to assume" (p. 90).