Bowl

Location: Japan

Materials: earthenware, painted and gilded

Dimensions: diameter 14.8 cm

Accession Number: S 128

Other Notes:

An earthenware bowl, with a fluted kiku-form body painted and gilt on both interior and exterior with an autumnal maple-tree. The leaves on the branches turning from green to orange.

At the end of the Meiji Era, Yabu Meizan’s workshop began to make a number of vases and bowls that were decorated with a single motif, carefully placed so as to complement the overall shape of the piece, instead of treating the pottery merely as a vehicle for virtuoso miniaturist painting. This return to a more traditional approach to ceramic decoration received official praise, but as it was not commercially successful the workshop continued to produce work in the conventional Meizan style.

Bibliography:

O. Impey, M. Fairley (eds.), Meiji No Takara: Treasures Of Imperial Japan: Ceramics Vol II, London 1995, cat. 97.

J. Earle, Splendors of Imperial Japan: Arts of the Meiji period from the Khalili Collection, London 2002, cat. 95, p. 152.