MJH Design Arts Furniture

Beautifully carved hardwood square stand with marble top. Carved rosewood with a figurative rouge marble top with lower shelf. Perfect accent piece or for use as a stand for sculpture...

Chinese export, circa 1820. An exceptional quality and rare form. Featuring figural landscape decorations in gilt to the main black lacquer doors, which open to reveal 13 separated c...

Large vintage Chinese ceramic garden stool features classic drum or barrel form with a band of large scale abstract graphic decor in relief and thin impressed band near the base. Min...

Finish -Walnut: Mahogany -Cane -Brass -Minimum wear to cane at the edges -Good vintage condition ...

Large Two Section Japanese Kitchen Tansu, Late 19th Century. Interior bottom section has been modified to accommodate a TV. Part of the back bot...

An antique Japanese Meiji period two-part tansu chest from the late 19th century with dark red lacquer, iron hardware, small safe and carrying handles. Created in Japan during the Meiji period (1868-1912), this wooden chest called an Isho-Dansu chest is a fine example of Japan's traditional mobile cabinetry. Tansus were portable chests...

A large Japanese Meiji period two-piece futon tansu cabinet from the late 19th century, with original iron hardware. Created in Japan during the second hal...

A Japanese Taisho period single section tansu clothing chest from the early 20th century in Isho-dansu style, with six drawers, safe, carrying handles and dark patina. Created in Japan during the Taisho period in the early years of the 20th century, this wooden Isho-dansu clothing chest features a linear silhouette perfectly complimented by a dark finish. The organized façade showcases six drawers (three large ones followed by two medium size and a smaller one), each fitted with iron hardware made of C-scroll handles and a central lock. The lower right section presents the safe, which opens to reveal additional drawers. Tansus were portable chests...

Antique Japanese Yosegi (Marquetry) Shibayama Ko Tansu, Meiji period The marquetry is composed of keyayaki (zelkova) and kakinoki (persimmon) wood. Two small doors with inlaid Moth...

A most charming Tansu. The sliding doors are covered in white Japanese hand made rice paper in traditional shell pattern and fitted with oval bronze hardware. Behind the doors a larg...

A highly important Japanese export lacquer cabinet with depiction of the Dutch East India Company tradepost Deshima and the annual Dutch delegation on its way to the Shogun in Edo Edo period, circa 1660-1680 H. 88 x W. 100.5 x D. 54 cm This cabinet includes a later European japanned stand, but also a modern powder-coated steel frame. The latter can be designed and added to your specific needs. The sides and front of the rectangular two-door cabinet are embellished in gold and silver hiramaki-e and takamaki-e on a black roiro lacquer ground with a continuous design. The two doors depict a long procession of numerous figures travelling on foot and horseback along buildings and a pagoda into a mountainous landscape. This is the annual court journey, Hofreis, of the Dutch from Nagasaki to the Shogun’s court in Edo. Three horseback riders are dressed as Dutch merchants and a fourth figure, probably het Opperhoofd, is seen inside a palanquin, norimon. Just about to cross the bridge, two men are carrying a cabinet like the present one. Many Japanese figures on either side of the procession are engaged in various activities; some play musical instruments on board of small boats, others are fishing; figures inside buildings are depicted playing go, and farmers are tending to their rice paddocks. The upper part of the right door shows a large mansion, probably the local daimyo’s castle, with men kneeling before a man in the central courtyard. The court journey fits in with the foreign policy of the shogunate which accorded a role to the VOC alongside China, Korea, and the Ryukyu Islands who also had to pay tribute. However, the VOC employees were traders, having low status in Japan’s social hierarchy, and they were received with less deference than were the state embassies from Korea and the Ryukyu Islands. Nevertheless, the contacts with the Dutch were a welcome source of information to the Shogun about Europe and European science and technology. The left side of the cabinet depicts, in mirror image, a rare view of the artificial fan-shaped Deshima Island, the trading post for the Dutch in Japan. The island, where the Dutch flag flies, is surrounded by small Japanese boats and an anchored three-masted fluyt (cargo ship), flying Dutch flags, with on the stern the VOC monogram. On the bottom right a busy street of Nagasaki is shown, bordered by shops and leading up to the stone bridge. On the island the trees are beautifully painted, two cows can be seen, and the flagpole, all in very fine detail. Dutchmen and enslaved Malay are visible outside the buildings and two Japanese figures, probably guards, sit in a small hut in the centre. A maximum of fifteen to twenty Dutchmen lived on the island at any time and soldiers or women were not allowed. Restrictions on Deshima were tight, and the merchants were only allowed to leave the island by special permission. The Opperhoofd had to be replaced every year, and each new Opperhoofd had to make a court journey to pay tribute, present gifts, and to obtain permission to Margaret Barclay eep on trading. In the distance, many birds fly above the hills and a four-story pagoda can be seen. The right side of the cabinet is painted with other horse riders and their retinue journeying through mountains. The pair of doors to the front open to reveal ten rectangular drawers. The drawers are decorated with scenes of birds in flight and landscapes with trees and plants. The reverse of the left door with two thatched buildings, one with a ladder, underneath a camelia tree with large blooms; the right door with a three-story pagoda nestled among trees and both doors with a flying phoenix, ho-oo bird. The cabinet, with elaborately engraved gilt copper mounts, hinges, lock plates and brass handles, is raised on an 18th-century English japanned wood stand. A pair of large cabinets...

A 19th century Annamese ceramic garden seat from Vietnam with green glaze, deer in scrolling foliage motifs and shaped base. Made of ceramic and boast...