Portrait of a woman in white: Lu Meiniang 廬媚娘像

Lu Meiniang (Eyebrow Maiden Lu) was a concubine of the Tang emperor who later became a Daoist immortal. Allegedly she was born with long, threadlike eyebrows--hence her name. With a sheer white robe and the gauze cap of a Confucian scholar, Lu is dressed in the attire common among Tang court ladies. The slender proportions of the figure and sharp angular brushstrokes of the drapery folds reflect the influence of late Northern Song figure paintings.