Late 19th Century Pair of Japanese Satsuma Vases

Two porcelain hexagonal Satsuma vases painted in polychrome enamels and gold. The paunch is decorated with intricate Japanese characters in a landscape, the neck and the shoulder wit...

Bulb-bottomed vase with long neck decorated with multicolored enamel and gold. It is embellished with arabesques, flowers and latticework patterns in orientalist taste on a marbled Bordeaux background. Remnants of a mark underneath. The fascination with the orient and its exotic decoration dominated the 18th-19th centuries. It was China that started the enthusiasm for the costumes and artistic shapes that came from faraway lands. However, as a result of conquests and colonial Expansion, this fascination saw the displacement of its origins. During the 18th century, Chinese and Turkish styles invaded the salons and gardens of royalty as well as affluent esthetes who prided themselves on their taste for The Orient. From then on, baths were Turkish, furniture was lacquered, Persian tapestries...

An Satsuma ceramic stone ware vase, circa 19th century, around the end of the Edo and the beginning of Meiji period. In the form of a Classic garlic bottle whose prototype was from China, the white bodied piece is decorated with an early form of kin nishikide, the so called golden brocade, a palette of iron-red, blue, green, yellow, purple and black with golden highlight. The over glazed enamel paint shows a group of robed figures in a garden setting with a lion and three tigers. A transparent overall glaze shows very fine crackles. The design is relatively sparse with plenty of negative space in contrast to the Satsuma production from the late 19th century, when the trend became fussy and overly glitz, due to the influence by the perceived western taste for the export market. This piece may still be made for export but its pattern was more influenced by both Kyoto Pottery and the Kano school of painting compared to the export ware by the end of the 19th century onward to the early 20th century. It was believed by many that this was a result of Satsuma potters visiting Kyoto in the late seventeenth century to learn over glaze painting techniques. There are some age glaze crackles especially around the foot. The piece is not signed in keeping with the earlier production before Satsuma ceramics...

Pair Antique 19th Century Japanese Satsuma Porcelain Urns with Foo Dogs, Circa 1880.