A fine and rare Nabeshima shaku-zara (large dish) Circa 1690-1760
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Find your local specialistA fine and rare Nabeshima shaku-zara (large dish)
Of circular form and raised on a tall, slightly tapering foot, painted in rich underglaze-blue and glazed in celadon with takarazukushi-mon (auspicious treasures) floating above two horizontal bands enclosing a wave design, the exterior decorated with a continuous peony scroll, with three blooms in variegated paler tones, the high foot with a band of shippo-tsunagi. 32.5cm (12¾in) diam., 8.1cm (3 3/8in) high, the foot 16.5cm (6½in) diam.
Footnotes
鍋島 青磁染付青海波宝尽文皿 1690年-1760年頃
This masterpiece of Japanese 17th century design is thought to date from the earliest period of porcelain manufacture at the Okawachi kilns, patronized exclusively by the Nabeshima Daimyo family, their friends and retainers, although it was also produced for presentation gifts to the Tokugawa.
Nabeshima wares were made only for domestic consumption, and for presentation purposes rather than for actual use. They were not sold on the open market in the Edo period but was made in a limited number, with specific patterns, and in standardized shapes. The dishes were produced in three basic sizes, the two smaller ones in sets of twenty or thirty, with a single large serving dish (of which fewer survive) to match. These were decorated in three ways: underglaze-blue and white; underglaze-blue and white with celadon glaze (as presented here); and full coloured enamels.
The image represents Buddhist symbols of precious emblems comprising the ribboned 'bag of plenty', hat of invisibility, flywhisk, sword, pair of books, castanets, fan, sho organ, pair of scrolls and tama (jewel), popular motifs in Japanese art.
Another Nabeshima shaku-zara decorated with an identifical design, possibly from the same set, is in the collection of the Hayashibara Museum, Okayama, Japan; see Nihon no Toji, Japanese Ceramics, vol.10, Nabeshima, edited by Hayashiya Seizo, no.121; the catalogue Iro Nabeshima, a Commemorative Exhibition, Asahi Shimbun, 1982, p.2, also illustrated in the Exhibition Catalogue, Les Cadeaux au Shogun - porcelaine precieuses des seigneurs de Nabeshima, Paris 1997, p.107, no.24.
For other Nabeshima shaku-zara with variations on the same design, see Catalogue of Selected Masterpieces from the Nezu collections, Decorative Art, Nezu Institute of Fine Arts, Tokyo 2001, p.143, no.166; John Ayers, The Baur Collection, Japanese Ceramics, Collection Baur, Geneve 1982, no.E53; Zaidan hojin Toguri bijutsukan zohin senshu, seireki 2000nen kinen zuroku (Selected Masterpieces from the Commemorative Catalogue of Toguri Museum of Art), Toguri Museum of Art, Tokyo, 2000, p.114, pl.166.