To Japanese women, hair ornaments were much more than mere accessories to feminine hair-do and attire. The comb progressed from a utilitarian object to a highly decorative one on which craftsmen and artists lavished their imagination and skill. In keeping with their inclination to beautify even ordinary items of everyday use, the Japanese turned hair ornaments into extraordinary artistic objects that mirrored the cultural and social history of the period. They reflected the life and status of their wearers, who were geisha, courtesans, ladies in the court and women in their homes. In their own small way, combs and hairpins provide a miniature glimpse of the exceptional beauty of Japanese art. (See the wonderful article “Combs and Hairpins” by Sharon Ziesnitz and Takeguchi Momoko in DARUMA 35, Summer 2002.)

“Object as Insight” was the accompanying publication to a landmark exhibition at the Katonah Museum of Art which was conceived and designed to introduce American audiences to both the ritual context and the artistic significance of Japanese Buddhist art. Never before in the Western world had such a comprehensive selection of Japanese Buddhist ritual objects been brought together and displayed in the contextual environment for which they were created. The exhibition was co-curated by Anne Nishimura Morse, Associate Curator of Fine Arts, Asia Department, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and Samuel Crowell Morse, Professor, Department of Fine Arts, Amherst College. It traveled to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

This fine exhibition catalog contains important essays by the curators and other scholars. The many illustrations, in both black-and-white and color, are accompanied by detailed descriptions. This catalog accompanied an important loaned exhibition of paintings, metalwork, calligraphy, statues, textiles and other ritual objects. Five years of original research culminated in this definitive exhibition of Japanese Buddhist art. Objects came from some of the most important museum and private collections in America, Europe, and Japan. This is a most important reference work on the subject of Japanese Buddhist art.

Since the beginning of the 19th century, sometsuke has played an important role in Seto’s long ceramic history. In 1807 Kato Tamikichi, who had spent years studying the various kilns in Hizen Province, including the Arita kilns, came to Seto and started the production of porcelain. He successfully produced high fired, cobalt blue and white decorated porcelain wares, known as “Seto-Sometsuke.” By the middle of the 19th century, many other famous potters had settled at the various Seto kilns, and high grade porcelains decorated with underglaze blue designs continued to be made.

Traditional Japanese art treats water, even the blue water of seas and oceans, in a stylized, linear fashion rather than handling it as a colored mass, as is the case in Western art. Layered waves, composed either of chevrons or half-circles and looking as if combed, are known as “seigaiha, the blue wave pattern. More extensive and freely drawn representations of high waves, foam and spray are known as “araumi” (rough seas) motifs. Although dragons in Japanese art are often teamed with a variety of motifs, the most common design pairings are with stylized cloud or wave motifs, reflecting the animal’s association with both the sky and the oceans. (See SYMBOLS OF JAPAN: THEMATIC MTOIFS IN ART AND DESIGN by Merrily Baird.) In ancient Japanese religion, waves – both those crashing against the shore and those returning to the sea – were considered the work of the Dragon King, who resided in the depths of the ocean. Rough waves thus expressed the Dragon King’s anger, and a calm sea indicated that his ire had subsided.

This large impressive vase is truly a tour de force, reflecting the great skill required to create an incredibly complex design which expresses such dynamic motion. It is impossible to capture the size and scale in photographs. This item is as close to a masterpiece as any piece of sometsuke we have ever owned.

The Ando Cloisonne Company, which was founded in 1880, is the oldest and largest corporation involved in manufacturing and dealing in shippo (cloisonne) in Japan. It has continued to produce fine cloisonné enamel wares up to the present day. Their products were first introduced to the world at the Chicago Exposition in 1893. Since then, the company has received many awards and prizes in numerous international expositions both in Japan and abroad, and in 1900 it was granted appointment to the Imperial Household. An identical Ando vase was offered for sale at Sotheby’s “Japanese Works of Art” on September 20, 1996, Lot #399, with a presale estimate of $1,500-$2,000.

As a sign of relaxation and welcome, tabako-bon – which are also called guest hibachi or “te aburi” -- played an important role in Japanese hospitality. Smoking was widespread among both men and women by the mid-Edo period, and the strong kizami tobacco was smoked only in small amounts in slender pipes with tiny pipe bowls (kiseru). Most tabako-bon were rectangular or round wooden holders for a charcoal container and a wood or bamboo cylinder. This natural burl smoker’s hibachi is crafted in a very unusual and imaginative style. Production of smoker’s hibachi ceased in the early 20th century, when cigarettes became fashionable and virtually replaced pipe smoking. This unusual smoking box may have also been able to accommodate cigarettes in the covered cylindrical receptacle.

The reverse is signed “Tai Min Seika Nen Sei” (Great Ming Chenghua Year Made) painted in underglaze blue within a blue ring on the glazed foot. This is an apocryphal six-character reign mark of Chenghua, a Chinese emperor in the Ming Dynasty who set very high porcelain standards. To the left of the reign mark is another blue mark with four characters which reads "Nabeshima Seizan.” Seizan was a Nabeshima kiln which produced studio pieces in elegant Nabeshima style during the Meiji period. The foot ring is unglazed, and there is one spur mark.

Nabeshima ware is considered to be the most Japanese of all the porcelains and the most technically perfect. It was made at Okawachi, north of Arita, and was named after the prince who founded the kilns at the end of the 17th century. The porcelain was of much higher quality than that made for export and was originally made as presentation ware for the local nobility. Production was limited, and less than perfect specimens were destroyed. Its elegance was considered to be the epitome of refinement, and production methods were kept a carefully guarded secret. From 1868 on, Nabeshima wares were produced for domestic use and Western export.

Also called Tokyo or Kanto style, the Edo type hibachi is of simple design, with straight sides and small drawers arranged down one side of the front of the box and across the bottom. This hibachi has five drawers. On the right side, there are three small drawers in graduated sizes for tongs and pokers, and two small drawers line the bottom of the brazier. Each drawer is trimmed with a darker wood. All the draw pull handles are hand crafted of bronze. An inner keyaki wood lip encloses the original copper-lined ash holder, and the hibachi’s trim is made of beautifully grained persimmon wood. Persimmon, a rare and highly prized wood in the ebony family, has a beautiful distinctive grain with orange, yellow or brown streaks in the black surface. Inset wooden finger holes with which to lift the hibachi are carved in curvilinear form on both ends. Finished on the top and all four sides, it views well from any angle. There is a finished slab of keyaki which sits atop of the side surface to protect it from burns.

Hibachi were finely crafted braziers used in old homes and shops to provide heat, warm sake and boil water for tea. Wooden hibachi were often designed for shops. They were meant to make a statement about the quality of the goods customers could expect to find there and to keep the storekeeper warm. As such, a lot of money and workmanship were lavished on these naga-hibachi. With a glass inset, these fine pieces make wonderful coffee tables, end tables or display cases for collectibles. (Enlargement Photo 12 shows an illustration of an Edo style hibachi used as a display case in “Japanese Accents in Western Interiors” by Rao and Mahoney, page 12.)

Produced mainly at the Seto kilns in Aichi Prefecture, oil plates were special flat plates with a unique perpendicular edge. They were placed on the lower level of the andon lantern where they were used to catch oil drippings and soot from the burnt wick or oil feeder above. These plates were in use from the mid-seventeenth century, when andon were first used indoors, until the early 1900’s, when the use of oil lamps and electric lights became widespread.

Most andon plates feature the design known as “tetsu-e” (“iron pictures”), the freestyle images painted in iron-oxide pigments directly onto the clay, frequently of sparse landscapes or subjects from nature. Some, such as this plate, were also further decorated with the copper green Oribe glaze. This type of oil plate is known as a “katagake” (“shoulder glazing”), with the thick green glaze on the top part of the plate and the brown tetsu-e pictures on the bottom. Andon plates with green Oribe glaze were produced mainly in Akatsu Village, which made pottery for and was protected by the Owari clan.

The fascination of aburazara for the collectors of Japanese folk art lies in their painted motifs. Their simple designs always possessed a spontaneous vitality, and the decoration on this plate is large in scale and freely executed. Considered a quintessential example of Japanese ceramic folk art, Seto oil plates are represented in most major collections of mingei or Japanese folk ceramics. See “Andon (Lantern) Plates” by Yamazaki Masumi, the cover article in DARUMA 42 for many wonderful examples of these oil plates, including Figure 6, which is similar in style to this one.

Yasokichi III is famed for his mastery of Kutani glazes, and the astonishing depth and color he has achieved with this vase are an excellent example of that skill. His works are mostly done in simple forms which do not compete with the spectacular colors and graduated glazes which so thoroughly dominate his ceramic art. Pieces made by this highly sought Japanese artist are consistently displayed at national and international exhibitions, and they are well represented in many museum and private collections as well.

Born Tokuda Masahiko in Komatsu, Japan, he started potting at the age of 18. He studied Kutani glazing with his grandfather, the first Yasokichi (1873-1957) and modern pottery with his father, Yasokichi II (1907-1997). Tokuda graduated from Kanazawa College of Art and won the NHK Chairman's Prize with his first entry in the Japan Traditional Crafts Exhibition in 1971. He won the highest award at the Japan Traditional Crafts Exhibition: the Japan Crafts Association's Chairman's Prize in 1977, the Hokkoku Shimbun Cultural Award in 1985, and the Japan Pottery Association Prize in 1986, when he was also designated an Intangible Cultural Asset of Ishikawa's kutani-yaki pottery. In 1988, he took the potter’s name Yasokichi. He won the Chichibunomiya Cup, the most prestigious prize at the Japan Pottery Exhibition in 1991. He was designated Important Intangible Cultural Asset (Living National Treasure) in 1997.

The upper tray held finely sifted wood ash, tamped flat and smooth, over which the wooden grid template was placed. A furrow was cut into the ash in the shape of the grid lines and then filled with powdered incense which burned at a uniform rate. Once the incense was placed into the continuous track, the grid was removed and the incense ignited. The latticework cover was then put in place to prevent a breeze from accelerating the rate of combustion of the burning incense. The incense would burn continuously for hours as the lighted edge made its way around the grid design.

Continual offerings of incense using a jokoban were often found in Japanese Buddhist temples during religious rites. Because long periods of time could be measured by the amount of incense burned, this type of Japanese incense clock was also used in community life as well as in the temples. Examples of old kobandokei show burn scars, overall evidence of handling and the presence of ash or powdered incense. Relatively few examples of antique incense clocks have survived. This is a rare item for Buddhist temples or serious Buddhist practitioners.