UKRAINIAN BANDURIST

I presume it would be intersting for you to know about this figurine. This is a porcelain bandurist (folk musician playing Ukrainian national instrument "bandura"). In old times wandering blind musicians performed "dumy" (folk songs), often of their own creation. They accompanied singing by playing bandura.
At present the tradition of male singing with bandura accompaniment still exist. We have a fantastic national male bandurist capella.
The figurine is the old time bandurist.

 

Hmmm...not unlike Japanese "goze".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goze
Also an excerpt from a book that mentions the Japanese sight-impaired historically as often musicians.
https://www.jstor.org/stable/3096791

 

Interesting commenst, thank you. The first organised guild like association of kobzar (bandura is a later version of kobza) players came back to 1700s. But mainly they were individuals who moved from village to village. They were paid for performances with food and lodging. The subject of their songs (dumy) was hard life of people and examples of how national heroes were fighting against opressors. It was kind of political activisties. That is why in 1937, Stalin organised kind of conference for the bandurists from all over Ukraine. It took place in Kharkiv (Ukraine). All participants were executed. There is a memorial in Kharkiv honoring them.
National capella of bandurists I mentioned above is a professional concert group.