1986: Set of funeral statuettes

1986: Set of funeral statuettes, porcelain type Qingbai, China, Song Dynasty (960-1279), MC 9780 to 9788

MC 9780 to 9788 Funeral statuaries Porcelain H. average 0,20 Kilns from Jingdezhen, Jiangxi province Northern Song Dynasty (960-1126) MC 9780-9788. Gift of the Antoni Laurent Foundation and the Society of Friends of the Cernuschi Museum, 1986. At the end of the Tang dynasty (618-907), funeral rituals changed. To the costly statuaries participating in the furniture of the beyond, we often prefer simulacra of paper, burnt during the funeral. The use of mingqi remains however attested at the time of the Song. Of nine statuettes which entered the museum in 1986, two of them are shown here: standing lady, and suppliant, figurines possibly linked to the theater. They are characteristic of the tendencies to realism and anecdotism of the statuary of the time, as evidenced by the reliefs of the caves of Dazu.