A GOTO SCHOOL PAIR OF GOLD MENUKI

Details
A GOTO SCHOOL PAIR OF GOLD MENUKI
MUROMACHI PERIOD (CIRCA 1500), ATTESTED TO GOTO SOJO BY GOTO ENJO

This pair of gold fittings are formed as a pair of gambolling shishi, the backs with well filed edges and the pins of male and female (in-yo) type--length of each 2.1cm., thickness 6.5mm.

Double wood storage boxes. Inner box with inscription by Sato Kanzan, dated summer, 1975.

Accompanied by an original origami signed Mitsutaka (Goto Enjo) and dated seventh day of the seventh month of Horeki 3 (1753); a tokubetsu kicho certificate issued by the N.B.T.H.K. number 169, dated Showa 46 (1971); and a tokubetsu kicho certificate issued by the N.B.T.H.K., no. 169, dated Showa 46 (1971). (2)
Literature
One Hundred Masterpieces (1992), no. 71.

Lot Essay

Goto Sojo (1461-1538) was the second Shirobei mainline master of the Goto school. He was born in Kyoto and was the second son of Goto Yujo (1432-1512). His elder brother Hikoshiro died at the age of twenty and therefore Sojo inherited the title. His style is very close to Yujo, with whom he worked for over thirty-five years, and he used many of the same designs. In 1501 at the age of forty he cut his hair and became a priest. He died at Sakamoto in Omi Province while in the service of Ashikaga Yoshiharu and Kuchiki Tanetsuna of Omi. He was buried in Kyoto at Rendaiji.

The workmanship of these menuki demonstrates his typical stylistic traits. The tri-indented cartouches (suhama) are four-lobed with joined lines, and the teeth of the shishi are almost hidden inside the mouth. These traits combined with the heads and tails which would fit into a diamond form, the small sparse (nanako) dots, the even wall construction of the backs, the well-filed edges, and the center poles (rectangular in shape for the inside menuki and round and tubular for the outside menuki), confirms this pair as classic examples of Sojo's work.

Goto Enjo (Mitsutaka, 1721-1784) was the thirteenth Shirobei mainline master of the Goto school.