Singing Figure

Spring and Autumn period, 770 - 476 BC
Gansu Provincial Museum

The liveliness and humor of this singing figure is enhanced by the very prominent tongue that is displayed within its open mouth. The figurine is made out of painted grey pottery. Its face, with inset eyes and pierced ears, is molded somewhat realistically beneath a curious, bottle-cap-shaped headdress. The body is a simple cylinder, decorated by chest nipples above a continuous arc that represents the singer's arms and clasped hands.

The clasped-hands posture is also used by art singers in the West (it gives them something to do with their hands). In China it also represented the attentive attitude of an inferior in the presence of a superior.