Portrait painting boomed in the Tang Dynasty. There were two important portrait painters in the mid-Tang Dynasty, Zhang Xuan and Zhou Fang. They were good at portraying court ladies. Their works symbolized a change in portraiture and were of special importance in Chinese painting history.
Spring Travel of the Guo State Queen by Zhang Xuan
The trend of artistic development in any given historical period was influenced by the social consciousness, cultural background and economic development of the time. In the mid-Tang Dynasty, after a hundred years of development, political power was becoming stable and the economy was prospering; epicurism was becoming increasingly opular among the ruling class.
（Source: chinaculture.org）
