ADMIRING THE WHITE HORSE Ink and color on silk, mounted as a hanging scroll. NOTE: The present work is notable for the elegancy of line and delicacy of coloring. For a discussion of the importance of the horse in the early Ming court, and the artists who depicted them, see Richard M. Barnhart et al, "Painters of the Great Ming, The Imperial Court and the Zhe School", Hong Kong, 1993, pp.119-123. It is interesting to note a vertical patch to the upper right, suggesting a signature had been removed, perhaps to allow an attribution to an earlier Song or Yuan artist, a fate apparently common to many Ming works, as noted ibid, p. 5.