A JAPANESE IMARI BALUSTER VASE

A JAPANESE IMARI BALUSTER VASE

EDO PERIOD, LATE 17TH/EARLY 18TH CENTURY

The tall body decorated with alternating fan and ribbon-shaped panels enclosing blossoming peonies, prunus and wisteria, another with squirrels amongst vines, one with Chinese figures in a mountainous river landscape and another with buildings by the shore, two fishing boats visible in the distance; all reserved on a dark navy-blue ground embellished with flowers and scrolling tendrils in gilt, 55cm.

Cf. Spink & Son, Far Eastern Art at Spink, Summer 1994, p. 57, no.64, for a related baluster vase from the Genroku Era. The authors explain that the ribbon-shaped cartouches imitate the decorative strips of paper known as tanzaku on which one would write a wish during the Tanabata festival.

See Japanese Works of Art, 1st July 2020, lot 218, for a pair of Imari vases from the collection of Lionel de Rothschild (1882-1942), Edmund de Rothschild (1916-2009), and the Trustees of Exbury House, with similar decoration of fan and ribbon-shaped panels on a dark blue ground sold in these rooms.