A FOUR-CASE INRO

SIGNED SOMADA, EDO PERIOD (19TH CENTURY)

Details

A FOUR-CASE INRO
Signed Somada, Edo Period (19th Century)
With black lacquer; decoration in gold and coloured hiramaki-e, gold and silver foil, gold dust and shell inlaid in Somada style; compartments and risers gold nashiji; rims gold lacquer; signed underneath in inlaid shell within a gold foil border Somada; hako netsuke and ojime decorated in the same techniques

Jurojin, a Chinese god of longevity, seated with his deer beneath an ancient pine tree; two cranes on the reverse; hako netsuke with a treasure sack, branches of coral and jewels; ojime with a band of shippozunagi decoration
3in. (8.9cm.) long

Provenance

Dr. Joseph Kurstin Collection

Literature

Eskenazi Limited, Japanese Netsuke, Inro and Lacquer-ware (London, 1986), cat. no. 46

Lot Essay

This inro is decorated in the style of shell inlay associated with the Somada, a family of lacquer artists traditionally said to have been founded by Somada Kiyosuke in the early eighteenth century. Kiyosuke is supposed to have learned the technique in Nagasaki, Edo-period Japan's window onto contemporary China, where shell inlay was one of the principal methods of lacquer decoration. Somada ware is characterised by intricate inlay of iridescent shell with tiny pieces of gold and silver foil laid flush with the ground which is usually black lacquer.
For a similar example, see Raymond Bushell, The Inro Handbook: Studies of Netsuke, Inro and Lacquer (New York and Tokyo, 1979), no. 74, p. 109.

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