Antique Japanese scrol painting of a landscape with boat. The water is very still and the moon is high over a mountain in the distance. A flock of geese swoops down from the sky on the right. On the far left, an outcropping of rocks partially obscures some rural houses. A willow tree drapes itself outward over the water. With signed tomobako. Signed Tan'yu and with the seal of his given name Moninobu. Certified by Eitoku, his grandfather...

A true treasure! Slightly distorted shoe shaped (kutsugata) tea bowl with a rounded brim, made of light, coarse, unrefined Mino clay. The expertly thrown body was trimmed with a potter's knife in its lower part around the foot ring.

The bowl was covered with a green copper oxide glaze...

17th Century Early Edo Period Spectacular Japanese Temple Sculpture of Baku, a mythical beast loosely representing an Elephant with a combination of other animals, creating an original form. The Baku is the "Dream Catcher" of ancient Japanese Shinto mythology. It is inserted in the ceiling to watch over the temple. This Baku is a masterpiece sculpture of magnificent presence. It will surely be the focal point in any environment...

An e-kagami of very small proportions 69.4mm (2.73 inches) in diameter, and 12.2cm (4.8 inches) weighing 51gm. Decorated with a sand textured ground and Hares, usage, leaping over stylised waves, nami,in this example taking the form of ryusuimon in which there is a reflection of a crescent moon. The mirror is signed Fujiwara and probably dates to the late seventeenth century, Mid Edo period. For condition see photos, some wear and minor corrosion. Worldwide shipping at Cost.

An impressive Japanese Soto zen calligraphy by the noted calligrapher, Gesshu Soko (1617-1696). Gesshu was known for his research and interpretation on Dogen's work, Shobogenzo (The Treasury of the Dharma Eye). The calligraphy is a famous zen phrase which translate as: The moon reflected on the water while the breeze amidst the pines blow in this eternal evening. What is the cause or purpose on this pure twilight...

An early Arita porcelain bowl made for export to the Far East. The decoration is based on a Ming Chinese dragon & phoenix bowl, the interior with a fish rising from waves. Fuyoyama or Tengudani kilns. See Impey, ‘The Early Porcelain Kilns of Japan, Arita in the First Half of the Seventeenth Century. Clarendon Press, Oxford.1996’ where several sherds are illustrated. Circa 1650 - 1680. Found in Cambodia...

A small circular table likely made as a stand for an incense burner or suiban basin dating from the Muromachi era (late 14th to 16th century ) covered in black lacquer over which has been applied vermillion in the style known as Negoro. About the center a ring of wood grain is typical of the era. It is supported by three curling feet extending from a billowing diaper. The lacquer, originally black, has oxidized to a mellow chocolate color beneath...

From our Japanese Collection, a good Fuyode Ko-Imari Arita blue and white porcelain dish, the term "Fuyode" referring to late 17th century Japanese porcelain painted in the style of Chinese Ming Dynasty porcelain. This is one of the earliest examples of Japanese Arita ware. This dish is painted in underglaze blue with a central panel of flowering peony, and with panels of the “Three Friends of Winter" design (pine, bamboo, and prunus) in the border...

From the Shoguns table to yours…why not? This is a lacquer tray elevated on scrolling legs decorated with squirreling tendrils and Mitsuba-Hidari Aoi Domoe (Left Swirling Triple Hollyhock) crests from the Shogun family. The flat surface is festive red with chirashi-mon design (scattered crests) duplicating that on the outside. The table is 38 cm (15 inch4s) square, 20 cm (8 inches) tall and in fairly good condition considering its age...

This is a Japanese anrique natural Dyed with vegetable dye beautiful hand embroidery kakesita obi of Mid-Edo period(1780-1800). There are a lot of thin stains over time. There is no damage. They are not disturbing, and as a whole it is in very good condition. Size:Length:348cm / 137inch Width:: 55cm / 21.6inch

Japanese Arita Blue and White Large Dish. Decorated with a deer standing in a landscape. L17thC Diameter 12.5" (31.7cm). Condition; good, some crazing to glaze especially to rear. Frit to rim.

Fine Japanese Arita Imari polychrome fluted bowl. Decorated in underglaze blue and maroon, yellow, red, and gold enamels with floral roundels between flowering shrubs, including plum and prunus, extending over the rim into the interior. The base with an iris. C1700. Dia. 9 1/2" (24.2cm). Condition: excellent, one small frit 0.2cm on rim.(See last image)

An Arita porcelain whistle in the form of a reclining Chinese boy. Decorated in Kakiemon-type overglaze blue, green and iron-red enamels...

An Arita small dish in ai-Kutani style decorated with a bird beneath a tree, all within a dog-tooth border. The plain back with an apocryphal four-character Ming Wanli reign mark. Circa 1700.

Approximately 16.9 cm diameter. Perfect condition.

Please study the photographs.

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An Arita dish in Kakiemon style dating to the period 1670-90 decorated in Shikishi Chirashi style with “Shikishi”, shaped poem cards which were used for the composing of both Poems and Small Paintings ,scattered, chirashi, over an asymmetric arrangement of Kara Kusa with Baika, plum flowers. The paintings depicting clouds and a hermit’s refuge. The design is quite austere almost in wabi sabi taste . The reverse decorated with a classic lotus scroll ring and a six character mark for the Ch...

A quintessential 16th century design in worn gold covers all the dark surfaces of this lacquered wooden box dating from the Momoyama period. Here auspicious cranes and turtles, reported to live a thousand years, laze among pines. About the lid boaters enjoy leisure seas. Ichimonji checkerboard patterns rising diagonally up the sides alternate with garden trees, the ends decorated with wisteria and ivy. The box retains the original inner tray in festive red decorated with garden grasses. It is w...

A unique early Edo Period 17th Century rectangular Lacquer Incense Box, with high relief and decorated with Gold Takamakie technique on thick Nashiji ground. Takamakie is a kind of relief combined with the Hiramakie technique. The base of the relief is made with charcoal powder. Hiramakie is　sprinkling metal powder or grains, sticking them onto the surface, using the adhesive ability of urushi tree sap. For sprinkling metal powders puffy raw silk threads are used while for grains a th...

A moulded rinka-gata form dish decorated in underglaze blue with additional enamels in the so-called Kakiemon palette. The outer register painted in underglaze blue with repeating pattern of a landscape with small weathered rocks from which grow auspicious Pomegranates and Peonies. The centre painted with a Chrysanthemum spray. The reverse painted with a simple Karakusa scroll and a six character mark for the Ming Emperor Chenghua. See British Museum Franks 516 for a similar Kakiemon dish with i...

An early Japanese blue & white plate produced in Arita at the end of the seventeenth century. The centre features a roundel carefully painted with a vase of flowers on a verandah. The unusual vase perhaps based upon a Dutch example. The ‘Kraak’ style border after Chinese Ming design.

For a similar plate see ‘Ko-Imari Porcelain from the Collection of Oliver Impey, Barry Davies Oriental Art, 1997’ where it is noted that sherds of similar examples have been found at the Kakiemon kil...

Ko Imari Arita Koi-gata Fish Shaped Dish Nagazara Genroku 17C A fine Arita sometsuke fish shaped dish carefully modelled in the form of a Carp, koi-gata o-sara dating to the late 17C. See “The Trakatori Collection” Kyushu Museum 2020 for a set of similar dishes there dated 1670-1690’s. This example probably dates from the 1690’s, the Genroku era. Fish shaped dishes were a popular accompaniment of the tea ceremony, Chinese ko sometsuke examples made specifically for the Japanese market ...

This is dangawari katazome & tsutsugaki cotton katsugi kimono of the Edo era(1770-1799). The 18th century. The form size of the collar of this katsugi kimono has a characteristic of the 18th century. This katsugi kimono is rare, and I recommend it to collection of you. It is indigo dyeing and green of very beautiful nature. It is a plum and a family crest of a hemp leaf and the motif of the flowering fern. There are dyeing spots, but there is not the damage, and the state is very good. size:124...

A fine gourd-shaped bottle decorated in Chinese Transitional style. Arita 1660 – 1680.

The bottle is decorated in late Ming style with the enjoyment of nature. These bottles are not uncommon but are seldom encountered with such fine painting.

The Catalogue of the Shibata Collection exhibits two similar bottles.

Approximately 20.4 cm high. The bottle is in perfect condition with only a couple of small areas of glaze evacuation on the neck, noted in the photographs. ...

Cylinder shaped (hanzutsu) tea bowl made of light, fine, unrefined Mino clay dating to early Edo Period. Shape and style make it appear contemporary with the late Oribe bowls.

The expertly thrown body is covered with the typical black oniita engobe inside and outside - with the exception of the bottom - over which a white, feldspatic Shino glaze has been poured. Just the foot ring and its immediate surrounding was left unglazed, and a triangle decoration is scratched into the iron...

A fine Kakiemon dish painted with a tako-karakusa, octopus scroll, arabesque ring to the border of the foliate moulded dish. The centre of the dish decorated with a symmetrically arranged ring with a repeating pattern of a stylised Pine grove, matsubara. The motif is probably a reference to the famous Awazuhara, pine grove of Awazu, one of the classic Eight Views of Omi, or alternatively a reference to famous Pine grove of Miho, Miho no matsubara, and based on a design taken from a contemporary ...

This large and expressive sculpture is made, as expected, from joined segments, each separately carved. This technique is a diagnostic "telltale" which helps to date the piece. The figure sits in a devotional posture, leaning slightly forward with hands joined in a gesture of worship. Extensive remains of gesso and pigment. The piece measures 14-1/2" in height and is free of re-carving or repair. Kindly examine the photographs, as they are part of the description. The piece has a wonderful, expr...

A pair of Arita plates decorated in underglaze blues with enamels. The centre painted with a large tripod censer containing Spring flowering Peonies on a low table flanked by a pair of flower vases, containing Autumn flowering Pinkes and Chrysanthemums with a pair of birds. The rim painted with a pair of Hoo birds with Chrysanthemums and Peonies. The plate on the left uses blue enamels, as found in the Kakiemon palette, rather than aubergine enamels as used on the right. The reverse un-decorate...

Historical Masterpiece - Early Edo (17c) Ko-Seto Chawan made by Kato Kagemasa (?-1659) with the old cloth and the wooden box of the period.

Kagemasa Kato was the 16th head of the Seto kiln family, counting from the 1st Kagemasa Kato (1168 - 1249), the legendary founder of Seto ware.

The bowl is covered with old Seto glaze creating a deep Sabi scenery. Thrown on a potter's wheel, the body was intentionally distorted and slightly stretched. The foot ring is cut in an irregula...

A good quality Kakiemon type export plate decorated with a pair of Hoo birds on a rock with flowering bushes. The rim of the dish decorated with a “Birdes in Branches” arabesque with a rather crudely painted Chrysanthemum blooms with birds both sitting and with wings out-stretched. This pattern occurs both in Kakiemon type enamels and in this blue and white version. See Fine and Curious no 240, a blue and white teapot, at page 193. See the Catalogue of the Complete Shibata Collection no 154...

Excellent light tea bowl fired in the Busan kiln which was run by the Tsushima feudal clan in the middle of the Joseon era (17c).

Gohon tea bowls represent the quintessence of the aesthetics of what tea bowls have to be at that moment.
This is the type of Koryo tea bowls which were made by the order from Japan in the 17th and 18th centuries.
The name Gohon (model) is derived from the fact that it was fired in Korea based on the model (underdraft and cut shape of the tea bow...

A very rare Kakiemon moulded dish, ozara, in a nigoshide type porcelain body dating from the first period of the Kakiemon kiln at Nangawara. The dish is moulded with various motifs and symbols of Longevity, including, a pair of cranes, pine, bamboo, a minogame, and prunus, and a pair of precious objects an artemesin leaf combined with a flywhisk. In between the framed motifs various forms of yoraku, pendant Buddhist jewels. The dish is of twelve sided form with a barbed rim suggesting the form o...

A good early Arita Ewer of European form, probably derived from a German stoneware precedent, and decorated in the style of Chinese Transitional export ware with a repeating pattern of bands of Birds and flowers. The jug stands 21.5cm and is in good condition with no chips or restorations, a short trivial hairline to the rim and to the handle, see image no 5. These are usually dated to the period 1660-80. See The Voyage of Old Imari Porcelains No 132 for a Jug of similar form and decoration ther...

A finely molded Kakiemon shallow bowl, five inches in diameter, the center of which is decorated in iron-red, blue, yellow and green enamel.

Ex-Christies

Condition: Excellent

One of a kind, a treasure with a special cultural and historical significance.: Kuro Raku Chawan, named 'Departing Geese', by legendary Tamamizu Ichigen (Ichigen I) with perfect kintsugi.

Ichigen was an illegitimate son of Kichizaemon Ichinyu (Ichinyu IV). He was raised in the Raku family until he was in late teens. Later he moved to Tamamizu village (present Idecho, Tsuzuki-gun, Kyoto), the hometown of his mother, and beside his studies with Raku ware he started Tamamizu ware main...

Antique painting of Hotei/Budai/The Laughing Buddha, standing with a walking stick, and four seated people. They are all observing the sky as what appears to be another Buddha or deity floats on a heavenly cloud, who wears a beautiful robe with gold detailing. Set behind glass and framed, 17th/18th century. Size: (entire frame) 19" height, 16.25" width (painting only) 9.5" height, 7.75" width

Japanese Arita blue and white plate, decorated with an insect on a rock, within a scrolling floral border. L17thC. Dia.8 1/4" (20.9cm). Condition: excellent, no damage.

A fine Arita sometsuke fish shaped dish carefully modelled in the form of a Carp, koi-gata o-sara dating to the late 17C. See “The Trakatori Collection” Kyushu Museum 2020 for a set of similar dishes there dated 1670-1690’s. This example probably dates from the 1690’s, the Genroku era. Fish shaped dishes were a popular accompaniment of the tea ceremony, Chinese ko sometsuke examples made specifically for the Japanese market date from the early 17th century, Tianqi era. The Koi was...