Box for personal accessories with autumn plants motif – tebako

Anonymous artist

Anonymous artist - Box for personal accessories with autumn plants motif – tebako
The decoration of the box’s outside panels is centred on the motifs of autumn plants – the eulalia, lespedeza and maiden flower – in a swampy scenery with water inlets. Its inside and bottom are done in simple nashiji. The craftsmanship-like execution of the decoration, the ample use of bokashi gradation and a certain torpidity of the motif rank this otherwise superb and clearly ostentatious work more in a class with late-period Japanese lacquerware. The item’s shape indicates a more modern form of a pewter-rimmed tebako hand box, a shape more often applied to later examples of this type of lacquerware, dating from the very end of the Edo period and of the beginning of the Meiji era. (See Filip Suchomel and Marcela Suchomelová: A Surface Created for Decoration, Prague 2002, pp. 256–257)
date:
measurements: height 19 cm
width 26,7 cm
depth 22,5 cm
material: Wood, tin-rimmed edging on lid and box
technique: Natural lacquer decorated in hiramakie, togidashi makie, nashiji and bokashi techniques
inscription:
inventory number: Vu 243
gallery collection: Collection of Asian and African Art