Folk Art: Clay Figurines (Part I)
By staff reporter HUO JIANYING Chinatoday 2008-7
THE Goddess Nüwa is said to have created human beings by molding men and women out of clay and breathing life into them, making her, in a sense, the first Chinese clay artist. It is a creation myth that can be found in historical manuscripts going back some 2,000 years, and it speaks of Nüwa’s loneliness in a world without people. To ease her solitude, she fashioned the human race out of common clay and became the Mother of Humankind.