When did "clay sculpture" appear?

Clay sculpture is a traditional sculpture handicraft in China, commonly known as "colored sculpture". Its production method is very interesting: first, a little cotton fiber is mixed into the clay, then it is mashed evenly, then it is kneaded into clay blanks with various patterns, dried in the shade, coated with bottom powder, and then colored.

The appearance of clay sculpture has a long history, which can be traced back to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period more than two thousand years ago. In the story of Su Qin dissuading him from entering Qin, there is a record of making clay figurines. The main reason for the development of clay sculpture art in China is the folk custom of making clay figurines to be buried with them, offering sacrifices to Buddha statues and playing with objects. During the Tang and Song Dynasties, clay sculpture reached its peak. Famous clay sculptures include the Bodhisattva in Dunhuang, Gansu Province and the statue of the Jin Dynasty maid-in-waiting in Taiyuan, Shanxi Province. By the Qing Dynasty, clay sculpture had formed two famous schools in the north and south: Tianjin clay figurine Zhang in the north and Wuxi Huishan clay figurine in the south. Among them, "clay figurine Zhang" refers to Tianjin clay figurine Zhang Changlin, who is a folk sculptor. His works are characterized by realism, and the word "image" is emphasized in character modeling, voice, smile and color decoration. His sons, Zhang and Sun, Zhang Jingju, inherited their ancestral business and made outstanding contributions to China's colored plastic arts.