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Major exhibitions and festivals over the last twenty years have vastly increased our awareness of the complexity of Japanese visual culture, both traditional and contemporary, but we are still apt to make sweeping generalisations about Japan that we would hesitate to apply to, say, Italy or Australia. The top lots in this sale will give collectors a rare chance to sample some less familiar expressions of Japanese design genius and skill in producing wares to suit particular markets, both domestic and international. The works of art on offer range from lacquered wares for use in late medieval monasteries to a porcelain bowl made early in the career of one of the country's leading ceramic artists. They also include some remarkable pieces made for export in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although auction-goers are familiar by now with the elaborately decorated lacquerwares with gorgeous decoration in gold and silver that were much prized by the Japanese elite during the Edo period (1615-1868), European collectors in particular have had few opportunities to acquire the more austere utensils traditionally associated with the Negoro temple complex, founded in the 12th century (lots 93-95). The Negoro temples grew enormously in power and wealth during the 15th and 16th centuries, and their warrior monks played a major part in the civil wars of the time until they were crushed by the warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi who destroyed the complex in 1585. The best-known of the earliest examples of Negoro ware is the so-called Hinomaru-bon, a circular tray in the Todaiji Temple dating from 1298 which conforms to the modern conception of Negoro, with a durable surface that has survived the wear and tear of time, is of sturdy construction and has the characteristic of being a common utensil and yet also a noble work of art. Conceptually speaking, Negoro wares can be placed at the intersection of several 20th-century approaches to Japanese art. They were appropriated by the founding fathers of the Japanese Mingei [Folk Craft] movement who were particularly interested in the way that the red layer of lacquer wears away in places to reveal the black beneath, even going so far as to claim incorrectly that it is this combination of red over black that defines the ware. Negoro ware's lack of ornament and powerful forms have earned it a place in that Western view of Japanese material culture that takes as its starting-point the balance and simplicity of the traditional interior. The association with communal Buddhist living - clear, frozen mornings in remote mountain temples, steaming rice served from a great red bowl - also strikes a chord with the West's many followers of Zen. 'Negoro', then, defines not only a rare, mysterious and beautiful type of lacquer, but also a contemporary view of Japan. It was probably a few years before the destruction of the Negoro Temple that lacquerers in Kyoto, Japan's ancient capital, first started to create wares for the Portuguese and other Europeans who had recently arrived in Japan for the first time. With the expulsion of the Portuguese from Japan in 1639, the focus of the export lacquer trade shifted to the Dutch, who were permitted to retain a small trading-post and had already had some success in selling Japanese lacquer in their home country. This trade flourished for several decades, but in the closing years of the 17th century competition from Chinese export lacquerware drove the Dutch out of the market, and from 1693 larger pieces no long appear in their official shipping lists. A unique set of six lacquered chairs, datable by their overall shape and style to the early 18th century (lot 128), demonstrates that despite this setback Japanese craftsmen could still, on occasion, produce highly ambitious wares as private commissions for Western buyers. The chairs, preserved for more than two centuries in a French chateau, are decorated with elements familiar from earlier lacquerwares as well as isolated floral motifs that would be increasingly popular in later export lacquers, and the little waves that are also seen on a dressing table that was made for Clive of India. Although he lived at a time when Japan was undergoing rapid and sometimes uncomfortable change as it struggled to turn itself into a modern industrial power, Shibata Zeshin (1807-1891), perhaps the greatest of all Japanese lacquerers, is celebrated for his efforts to uphold the traditional values of the Japanese craftsman. Something of a conservative in his frugal lifestyle and his insistence on the most painstaking and time-consuming manual processes, Zeshin was also a technical innovator. The unusual patinated bronze colour of the small tray with a design of birds and waves (lot 92), called seidonuri [bronze-lacquering] in Japanese, was invented by Zeshin, and was achieved by scattering several different layers of charcoal and bronze dust on the wet lacquer and polishing them with different oils and powders so as to get a patinated, antique appearance. To achieve the wave-pattern seigaiha effect, sometimes reminiscent of the paintings of Bridget Riley, Zeshin devised a method of drawing a comb or pointed spatula through a thin layer of wet lacquer, an apparently simple technique requiring great skill and accuracy as the work had to be perfectly executed in a very short time before the lacquer dried. Despite his lack of full engagement with the process of modernisation, Zeshin frequently exhibited at the National Industrial Exhibitions that were held every few years during the Meiji Period (1868-1912). Two of his contemporaries, the carver Ishikawa Komei (1852-1913) and the lacquerer Yasui Hochu (1857-1922), were much more enthusiastic participants in such events, and the hardwood cabinet with decoration of two deer (lot 71) is one of the most important Japanese exhibition pieces ever to be offered at auction. The cabinet was submitted by Hayashi Kuhei, a leading dealer and craft entrepreneur whose label is pasted to the base, and a study of the meticulous records that were kept by the Japanese authorities reveals that this is almost certainly the same as the 'hardwood shodana with ivory inlays' shown in at the third National Industrial Exhibition, held in 1890. The 1890 exhibition was partly intended as a preparation for Japan's participation in the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, the last and greatest of the 19th century's international exhibitions, held on a 688-acre site in Jackson Park on Lake Michigan, Chicago. Japanese wares were exhibited in several different parts of the complex - including both the exclusive Palace of Fine Arts and the huge Manufactures and Liberal Arts Building, covering eleven acres - and no effort was spared in a concerted bid to ensure that the best that Japan could offer was shown to the best possible effect. A few pieces, however, were bought before they could be sent to Chicago, among them a magnificent cloisonné enamel vase (lot 199) which is accompanied by a letter to its English buyer, a Mr Fox, dated 3 March 1893. This valuable document includes the information that the vase was made in Nagoya - an important centre of cloisonné manufacture - and was bought for 620 dollars, when it was 'about going to the Chicago exposition', from 'Messrs. Kuhn', the important trading house of Kuhn and Komor, with offices in Yokohama, Kobe, Hong Kong and Shanghai. The writer suggests that the buyer may wish to put the vase up for auction at 'Christies in London', where it would bring 'at least 200 pounds'. More than a century later the vase will at last make its appearance at King Street, where it is expected to realise more than 100 times that sum. In Japan no less than in the West, the economic and cultural upheavals of the industrial revolution left the craft world in a state of considerable dislocation and self-doubt. Initially inspired by the displays at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Tomimoto Kenkichi (1886-1963) was in the forefront of the revival of underglaze-blue decorated porcelain in its new 20th century guise as a 'studio craft', his trademark incised and painted decoration showing the influence of Korean ceramics. Lot 98, a rare and early example of Tomimoto's work, is accompanied by a wooden storage box that was inscribed at a later date by his assistant Kondo Yuzo (1902-1985) who later became one of Japan's best-known post-war ceramic artists and was, like his master, awarded the title of holder of an Important Intangible Cultural Property ('Living National Treasure'). Joe Earle NETSUKE, INRO AND OTHER SAGEMONO VARIOUS PROPERTIES Lots 1-7 all have fitted wood boxes signed by the artist Takamura Koun (1852-1934). It is reputed that these netsuke were once in his collection. At the age of twelve, Koun entered the school of Takamura Toun who later adopted him. He became a professor at the Tokyo Art School and was appointed a member of the Imperial Art Committee.1 1 Raymond Bushell (adapted from the Japanese by), The Netsuke Handbook of Ueda Reikichi (Tokyo, 1961), no. 555, p. 251.

A STAINED BOXWOOD NETSUKE

SIGNED JUGYOKU, EDO PERIOD (19TH CENTURY)

Details

A STAINED BOXWOOD NETSUKE
Signed Jugyoku, Edo period (19th century)
Of a kitsune [fox] holding in his arms a tsuzumi [drum], signed on the left leg Jugyoku, with a wood box inscribed with an appreciation by Takamura Koun signed Takamura Koun shi [recorded by Takamura Koun] with seal Koun
1¼in. (3cm.) long

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Lot Essay

The subject alludes to the popular legend of Shizuka and the drum she received as a souvenir from her lover Yoshitsune when she performed a last dance in front of him, while escaping to Yoshino. The drum was covered with fox's skin and the story mentions that one day a fox came to her to claim the musical imstrument because the skin was its mother's.

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