Purple Chawan by Legendary Miyashita Zenji 宮下善爾
$650.00
A tea bowl with stunning glaze by the legendary Miyashita Zenji 宮下善爾 (1939-2012), one of the greatest contemporary Kyoto potters. This is an early work, when he focused on celadon-like glazes. At that time he was studying ancient Chinese pieces, and was influenced by his father who excelled in celadon. His tea bowls are not common, and purple ones are quite rare.
Piece is simply titled Tea Bowl (Chawan 茶碗), it is glazed stoneware, from Shōwa Period, late 1970. Piece is 6.9 x 13.8 x 13.7 cm and sealed on the bottom Zen (善). It is in perfect condition: there are no cracks or repairs; minor imperfections from firing.
Comes in an original signed accompanying box (tomobako) and original sealed cotton shifuku: red seal Miyashita (宮下), and artist biography (in Japanese), from 1978.
Tomobako inscription: Green Crystal Glaze Flower Vase (Rokushōyū kabin 緑晶釉花瓶); signed: Made by Zenji (Zenji saku 善爾作), red seal Zenji (善爾).
A transcription of all inscriptions and seals accompany the Certificate of Authenticity.
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One of the best known contemporary potters in the west, Miyashita Zenji 宮下善爾 (1939-2012) was the son of Miyashita Zenju, a well-known Kyoto potter known for his celadon wares. Like his father, Zenji excelled in producing celadon wares, emulating ancient Chinese aesthetics, which he almost exclusively produced until the mid 1980s when he added colored clay works to his repertoire. He continued to create celadon wares that showcase the potter’s mastery of firing techniques. He was 23 years old when his work was accepted into the annual Nitten juried exhibition, where he won an astounding eighteen prizes over the course of his career. He is in the collection of every major museum that collects contemporary ceramics, including the Metropolitan Museum NYC, Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art, Minneapolis Institute of Art, the British Museum, Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, and a plethora of museums in Japan including the Museums of Modern Art in Tokyo and Kyoto.
For more information on the artist, please see the following publications: Baekeland, Frederick: Modern Japanese Ceramics in American Collections; New York: Japan Society, 1993; Lurie, Samuel and Chang, Beatrice: Contemporary Japanese Ceramics: Fired with Passion; New York: Eagle Art Publishing, 2006.; Mintz, Robert: The Betsy and Robert Feinberg Collection: Japanese Ceramics for the Twenty-first Century; Baltimore: The Walters Art Museum, 2013.; Earle, Joe: New Forms, New Voices: Japanese Ceramics from the Gitter-Yelen Collection; New Orleans: New Orleans Museum of Art, 2017.
