SHIBATA ZESHIN 柴田是真 (1807–1891) SMALL BOX WITH DESIGN OF AUTUMN GRASSES 秋草図素彫小箱
Meiji era (1868–1912), circa 1870–1890A small box with kabusebuta (overhanging lid), the body, with rounded edges, likely constructed using a combination of the magemono (bentwood) and harinuki (layered-paper) techniques, the reddish-brown lacquer ground cut and engraved in subori with a design of susuki (plume grass) and fujibakama ('purple trousers' or thoroughwort); signed with incised characters inside the lid at lower left Zeshin 是真3.9cm × 8.5cm × 7.4cm (1?in × 3?in × 2?in) With fitted clear-lacquered wood tomobako inscribed Zeshin saku akikusa-bako 是真作 秋草箱 (Box with autumn plants by Zeshin) and paper label from the Zeshin Hyakunijūnen Tsuizen Tenran 是真百廿年追善記念展覧 (Zeshin 120th Anniversary Display), held in Tokyo in 2011 (4)Provenance:Sold in these Rooms, 10 November 2015, lot 1Exhibited:Zeshin Hyakunijūnen Tsuizen Tenran, Tokyo, 2011Exhibited and Published:Nezu Bijutsukan (Nezu Museum) 2012, cat. no. 56
注脚
In his catalogue note for the 2012 Zeshin exhibition at the Nezu Museum, Takao Yō comments that Zeshin used a single marukebori (curved line-engraving) knife to execute this delicate composition. For a somewhat larger box by Zeshin with a related autumnal design in different techniques, see Earle and Gōke 1996, cat. no. 21.