SIGNED NIHON KOKU KYOTO JU KOMAI SEI, MEIJI PERIOD (LATE 19TH CENTURY)

Details

A Fine Komai Vase
Signed Nihon koku Kyoto ju Komai sei, Meiji period (late 19th century)
Worked in gold and silver hirazogan, takazogan and nunomezogan with two large opposing panels depicting two samurai warriors fighting, the other with a general and attendant looking out over a bay, surrounded by camp curtains decorated with paulownia mon, the vase with intricate grape vine to the shoulder, above a geometric border and roundels containing ho-o birds and dragons, the neck with stylised kiku
26cm. high

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Lot Essay

Around 1873 Komai Otojiro started selling damascened ironwares in Kobe, a centre of foreign trade, and within a few years his chargers, plaques, cabinets, model pagodas, and vases were in such demand that he was prosperous enough to buy a large house. The name of Komai seldom appears, however, in the lists of artists for international or national exhibitions until 1903, presumably because a Kyoto dealer, Ikeda Seisuke, marketed most of their work. It was Ikeda, for example, who won a gold medal at the Paris Universal exposition of 1900 for a plate of gold and silver which may well have come from the Komai workshop.

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