JAPAN, MEIJI PERIOD (LATE 19TH CENTURY), EACH SIGNED ZESHIN (SHIBATA ZESHIN; 1807-1891)

Details

A LACQUER FOUR-CASE INRO WITH MATCHING LACQUER HAKO-NETSUKE
JAPAN, MEIJI PERIOD (LATE 19TH CENTURY), EACH SIGNED ZESHIN (SHIBATA ZESHIN; 1807-1891)
The inro with a rounded rectangular body and a dark-green seido-nuri ground lacquered in aokin, gold and iro-e takamaki-e, and hiramaki-e with details of inlaid aogai (shell), keuchi and kirikane depicting two itomari (silk brocade balls), executed in a variety of textures, lying over pine needles and clumps of dandelions, the design continuing on the reverse with a bamboo hanaike (flower vase) lying beside more dandelions, the compartments and risers of gold nashiji, the shoulders gold fundame, signed in scratched characters on the base Zeshin, with an amber ojime; the hako-netsuke similarly lacquered in gold takamaki-e and inlaid aogai with assorted takaramono (auspicious objects) including a tsuchi (Daikoku's magic mallet), fundo (weight), two tama (wish-granting jewel) and a kakuregasa ('invisible straw hat') and finely-engraved branches of coral resting against each other, signed in scratched characters on the base Zeshin.
3 1⁄8 in. (8 cm.) high

Provenance

V. E. Blad Collection, purchased at Sotheby's, London, 6 May, 1969.
Wrangham Collection, no. 904, with original collector's label.

Literature

INRO: An exhibition of Japanese Inro from the collection of E.A. Wrangham, exhibition catalogue, Oxford, 1972, p.33, cat. no. 59 (ill.)
Robert Schaap (ed.), Meiji Japanese art in transition, the Haags Gemeentemuseum, Society for Japanese Arts and Crafts, Leiden, The Netherlands, 1987, p.114, no.181 (ill.)

Exhibited

Oxford, Ashmolean Museum, INRO: An exhibition of Japanese Inro from the collection of E.A. Wrangham, 9 October - 4 November 1972.
The Hague, The Netherlands, Meiji Japanese Art in Transition, 21 March - 24 May 1987.

Conditions of sale

Présenté par

Zheng Ma Head of Department, Senior Specialist

zma@christies.com +33 (0)1 40 76 83 67

Descriptif du lot

Itomari or temari (balls made from silk thread) were a favourite children's gift at New Year. Zeshin often depicted two of them, one slightly larger than the other, to symbolize the many festivities that mark the first month. For a similar treatment of the identical design decorating the cover of a lacquer two-tiered Gosekku maki-e tebako in the collection of the Suntory Museum, see Kubo Sachie, Seki Kasumi, Shibahashi Daisuke, and Oshiro Anna, Mada mada zawatsuku Nihon bijutsu (More and More: Unsettling Japanese Art), exhibition catalogue, Tokyo, Suntory Museum, 2025, pp.96 and 97, nos.4-6. See also lot 155.

En savoir plus sur Fine Asian Art

View All