UNSIGNED, EDO PERIOD (19TH CENTURY)

細節

A SUZURIBAKO [BOX FOR WRITING-UTENSILS]
Unsigned, Edo Period (19th Century)
Black lacquer ground with gold flakes; decoration in gold hiramaki-e, takamaki-e and togidashi-e with gold and silver foil and inlay of gilt metal and silver, and silver and gold foil; rims gold lacquer

The lid with two shishi [imaginary lions of Chinese origin] on a tall rock above waves against a gilt metal sun; the interior with a saddled but riderless horse grazing beside a stream; the ink-stone with a gold lacquer rim; gilt bronze suiteki [water-dropper] in the shape of a melon
1 3/8 x 8¼ x 8 7/8in. (4.2 x 21.0 x 22.6cm.)

注意事項

No VAT will be charged on the hammer price, but VAT at 17.5% will be added to the buyer's premium which is invoiced on a VAT inclusive basis.

拍品專文

The grazing saddled but riderless horse is probably, despite the absence of ominaeshi plant [patrinia], a reference to a poem by the Autumn section of the Kokinshu anthology by Sojo Henjo (Bishop Henjo, 816-90):

Na ni medete Just because I loved
oreru bakari zo your name I had to pick you,
ominaeshi maidenflower -
ware ochiniki to please do not let others know
hito ni kataru na1 the depths I have fallen to

The motif of a riderless horse grazing by ominaeshi plants, appears on an unsigned writing-box in the Idemitsu Art Museum, Tokyo, attributed to a member of the Yamamoto Shunsho family; the same design is included in Shunsho hyakuzu, a book of Shunsho lacquer designs, alongside the poem given above.2 In both cases, the horse design is seemingly unrelated to the motifs on the exterior of the lid. Another version of the design, this time with characters from the poem included, is to be found in the Red Cross Catalogue.3

1 Saeki Umetomo (ed.), Kokinwakashu [A collection of poems ancient and modern] (Tokyo, 1958), no. 226
2 V-F. Weber, Koji Hoten, Dictionnaire à l'Usage des Amateurs et Collectionneurs d'Objets d'Art Japonais et Chinois (Paris, 1923), vol. 2, pp. 327-8; Nagoya City Museum, Maki-eshi Shunsho [The maki- e master Shunsho] (Nagoya, 1992), cat. no. 85
3 Henri L. Joly and Kumasaku Tomita, Japanese Art and Handicraft, Loan Exhibition Held in Aid of the British Red Cross (London, 1916), no. 8 (p. 57), plate LIX.