Page 70 - 2021 March 16th Japanese and Korean Art, Christie's New York City

PROPERTY FROM A PRINCELY COLLECTION
50 A LACQUER TWO-CASE INRO

EDO-MEIJI PERIOD (19TH CENTURY), SIGNED ZESHIN(SHIBATA ZESHIN; 1807-1891)
The rectangular form, designed to simulate
a chipped and cracked ink cake, each side
with a sunken panel, one side with musical
instruments and an inscription in archaic
Chinese characters, the reverse with a Chinese
ceremonial vessel known as a tan ting, both
sides with a incised crackled ground
3 in. (7.6 cm.) high

$20,000-30,000

PROVENANCE:
Kelsch Collection

Zeshin became a prolific painter of popular subjects
and was hugely popular with the Edo townsfolk in Edo
period Japan. His light-hearted and vivid depictions of
everyday Japan, its custom, and legends were among
the earliest art to find favor in the West after the
Imperial Restoration. But it is as a lacquer artist that
Zeshin is perhaps best known, and for which his art
was acclaimed at the great expositions both in Japan
and overseas in his last decades. His diverse work
encompassed the Shijo and Rinpa schools, and the
Chinese-inspired work of Ogawa Haritsu (1663-1747).
He introduced the technique of painting on paper with
lacquer to give an impression of richness and three-
dimensionality.

The lacquer surface of this work has been deliberately
made to simulate an old, chipped inkcake. The Chinese
inscription is taken from the 6th volume of the Fang shi
mopu (The Fang Family Compendium of Ink Cakes)
from 16th century. For a similar lacquer inro by Haritsu
in the colelction of the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
go to: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/
search/58914