41 - SHIBATA ZESHIN: A LARGE AND FINE LACQUERED WOOD ‘NATAMAME AND SNAIL’ INCENSE CONTAINER

SHIBATA ZESHIN: A LARGE AND FINE LACQUERED WOOD ‘NATAMAME AND SNAIL’ INCENSE CONTAINER By Shibata Zeshin (1807-1891), signed Zeshin 是眞 with seal Shin 眞 Japan, Tokyo, late 19th century, Meiji period (1868-1912) Published: Resonance of Wa - The Japanese Spirit. Casal Collection, 2025, p. 165. Naturalistically carved in the form of an elongated sword bean (natamame), the smoothly polished wood preserving the irregular contours and subtle surface character of the pod. The detachable central section forms the lid and is applied in high relief with a snail, its shell finely inlaid in mother-of-pearl and its body rendered in masterful gold takamaki-e. The rim finished in gold fundame. Signed to the reverse ZESHIN with seal Shin. LENGTH 43.3 cm Provenance: Ex-Collection of Ugo Alfons Casal, acquired from the above. Osaka City Museum of Fine Arts, bequeathed from the above and subsequently de-accessioned in 2021. With a collection label ‘1460’ to the interior. Ugo Alfons Casal, of Swiss-German origin, was born in Florence, Italy, in 1888. He moved to Japan in 1918, working first at the Osaka branch of George H. McFadden & Brothers and later at F. S. Morse & Co. in Kobe from 1920 to 1938. Primarily involved in the cotton trade, Casal spent most of his life in Kobe, with a few years in Yokohama, until his death in 1964. Throughout his time in Japan, he remained passionate about collecting Japanese art. In the late 1930s, amidst deteriorating relations between Japan and the United States, Casal planned to move his collection to America. However, the outbreak of the Pacific War in 1941 halted this plan, and the collection was instead stored in wooden crates at Kobe Port. With the help of his personal connections, Casal successfully moved the collection to the Osaka City Museum of Fine Arts, where it was kept in storage during the wartime and postwar years. After his death, the collection was bequeathed to the museum, where it remains one of the most valuable collections in Japan, with over 4,000 items. Condition: Excellent condition with old wear and typical natural flaws to the material. Few natural age cracks. The mid-section is removable. With a wood tomobako (storage box) inscribed ‘Zeshin makie kodutsu, chinto’ [An incense container in the shape of a rare sword, made by Zeshin]. Shibata Zeshin (1807-1891) was among the most accomplished lacquer artists of the late Edo and Meiji periods and was appointed one of the first Teishitsu Gigeiin (Imperial Court Artists) in 1890. Celebrated for combining highly innovative lacquer techniques with close observation of the natural world, he was particularly adept at exploiting the inherent form and texture of his chosen material. The treatment of the snail was likely inspired by Jikan Ganbun, whose naturalistic compositions of humble creatures such as snails and insects, usually enriched with mixed-media inlays, clearly resonated with Zeshin. Zeshin’s engagement with Ganbun was recurrent rather than isolated, and is even made explicit in works such as the bamboo hako netsuke signed Narau Ganbun, Zeshin (‘Zeshin, emulating Ganbun’), likewise decorated with a snail. In the present work, Zeshin adapts this Ganbun-inspired vocabulary to his own refined lacquer idiom, setting the lustrous mother-of-pearl shell against the natural wood of the monumental natamame. Auction comparison: Compare a related bamboo hako netsuke by Shibata Zeshin, after Jikan Ganbun, similarly decorated with a snail in gold takamaki-e and metal inlay, signed Narau Ganbun, Zeshin, 3.8 cm long, at Bonhams, The Edward Wrangham Collection of Japanese Art: Part III, 15 May 2012, London, lot 140 (sold for GBP 10,625 or approx. EUR 18,500 converted and adjusted for inflation at the time of writing).