Jingdezhen, China
Ming Dynasty, Tianqi Period (1620-1627)
Thickly potted in the form of a sakinbukuro pouch decorated with two ascending and two descending cranes with wings outstretched flying amongst stylised clouds in underglaze blue. 17.5cm high, 18.5cm diameter. Together with an early black lacquer lid and an early Japanese wooden box, the interior of the lid of the box inscribed and signed with kao by Horinouchi Sokan (Kenchusai), Omotesenke Horinouchi XII (1919-2015), Iemoto of the Horinouchi branch of the Omotesenke School of tea. Cat. 524
For an example of the same shape but different design, see Kosometsuke: Monochrome Section, Masahiko Kawahara, Kyoto Shoin Co., Ltd., 1977, p. 204 / pl. 760.
Note: A sakinbukuro was a leather pouch used in medieval Japan for carrying gold dust, a common way for the elite to make payments. Thus the form becomes an auspicious wish for wealth and good fortune, and the cranes a wish for longevity.
Condition report (carefully viewed under UV, strong light and magnification): some fritting around the rim and a horizontal firing crack to the interior where the two halves of the pot were luted together in production, which is open in the interior but closed and glaze-covered on the exterior, although there is a corresponding slightly dark line around the exterior in some areas.
Jingdezhen, China
Ming Dynasty, Tianqi Period (1620-1627)
Thickly potted in the form of a sakinbukuro pouch decorated with two ascending and two descending cranes with wings outstretched flying amongst stylised clouds in underglaze blue. 17.5cm high, 18.5cm diameter. Together with an early black lacquer lid and an early Japanese wooden box, the interior of the lid of the box inscribed and signed with kao by Horinouchi Sokan (Kenchusai), Omotesenke Horinouchi XII (1919-2015), Iemoto of the Horinouchi branch of the Omotesenke School of tea. Cat. 524
For an example of the same shape but different design, see Kosometsuke: Monochrome Section, Masahiko Kawahara, Kyoto Shoin Co., Ltd., 1977, p. 204 / pl. 760.
Note: A sakinbukuro was a leather pouch used in medieval Japan for carrying gold dust, a common way for the elite to make payments. Thus the form becomes an auspicious wish for wealth and good fortune, and the cranes a wish for longevity.
Condition report (carefully viewed under UV, strong light and magnification): some fritting around the rim and a horizontal firing crack to the interior where the two halves of the pot were luted together in production, which is open in the interior but closed and glaze-covered on the exterior, although there is a corresponding slightly dark line around the exterior in some areas.
