Ballad singer

The hard, compact body of this piece, fired at high temperatures, is typical of MingQi terra cotta from Sichuan at the end of the Han era. The shuochang actor portrayed here is telling a story while accompanying himself on a small drum held under his left arm and beaten with a stick held in the other hand. His whole body seems to be involved in the story-telling, with exaggerated mimicry and his face distorted into grotesque expressions. The man is hunched, fat and out of proportion, with limbs that seem too short for his elongated torso and large belly; he may be a dwarf. His bare torso displays a pronounced flabby chest and his huge posterior is seated on a raised circular base. His left knee is bent, with the foot raised, and his right leg is stretched upwards in front of him. His only clothing is a loose pair of trousers that leave his navel exposed and whose embossed edge can only be seen on the back of the figure. On his head he wears a straight cap, rounded in the centre and raised towards the back. The caricatured facial expression is accentuated by the deep wrinkles around the forehead and mouth, which is grimacing, with the tongue protruding. The drum is tied to his arm with a string of beads in sharp relief, while the stick is held vertically with the other arm stretched forward. It is shaped rather like a pestle, in a long truncated cone with rounded ends, which is narrower in the part that is held.