Page 10 - Bonhams May 15, 2019 Huthart Collection Netsukes London

Robert S. Huthart

Robert S. Huthart was born in 1922 in Newcastle, in the north-east of England. After serving in
the Royal Air Force during World War II, he joined a Hong Kong firm of chartered accountants in
1947. Happy to settle in Hong Kong for the rest of his life, he was recruited by the department
store conglomerate Lane Crawford Ltd. as Secretary in 1950. Appointed as Managing Director
in 1958 until his retirement in 1985, he is widely credited with building the great commercial
success of Lane Crawford Ltd. Also committed to helping the local community, he acted as
Trustee/Director of a large charitable trust, and as President of the Hong Kong YMCA.

Robert Huthart collected widely within the fine and decorative arts. His particular interest in
netsuke began by chance on a visit to Tokyo. During a medical check-up there, he was given
a small book by a friend to help pass the time. This book was The Wonderful World of Netsuke
by Raymond Bushell. Huthart became fascinated by the pieces illustrated in the book, and
swiftly set about collecting netsuke with great enthusiasm during his worldwide travels. Initially
unfamiliar with the world of specialised netsuke dealers and international netsuke auction
sales, he began collecting guided only by the knowledge he had taught himself. However,
while visiting Honolulu he met Bernard Hurtig, at that time the driving force behind the growing
‘International Netsuke Collectors Association’. This friendship expanded Huthart’s access to
rare and interesting netsuke, allowing him to acquire finer examples. His personal favourites
included outstanding pieces by Kyoto and Tanba artists, and examples by Masanao and
Kaigyokusai Masatsugu.

After some time, his scholarly interest and personal preference led him to focus on the
distinctive netsuke produced by late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century carvers based
in the seaboard province of Iwami (present-day Shimane Prefecture). His first purchase of an
Iwami netsuke, in January 1979, was a work by Seiyodo Tomiharu. It depicts a rat sitting on an
inkstick, carved from the rare kurogaki (black persimmon wood), and is included in the present
auction as lot 32. In addition to the fine quality of the carving, he was intrigued by the four-
line inscription in raised ukibori characters, which he knew to be a rare feature. Familiar with
netsuke inscriptions and signatures formed of only a few characters, he found it unusual for
this netsuke to be carved with an inscription several lines long. He was fascinated to learn, in
translation, that not only did the inscription give the name of the carver Seiyodo Tomiharu, but
it also identified the specific location where it was carved, in Seigen’an in Iwami (‘west of the
Ishi River’, another name for the Eno River), and the exact date that the netsuke was carved (‘in
1782, on the twentieth day of the eleventh month’).

This immediate connection with a specific netsuke carver, on a precise date in an earlier era,
cemented Huthart’s passion for documentary Iwami netsuke. During the following decades,
he sought out and acquired many more pieces, eventually amassing the finest collection ever
formed of Iwami netsuke. Bonhams is privileged to offer, in two London auctions in 2019, a very
extensive selection from this unique and extraordinary collection.