TWO JAPANESE KESA ROBES

TWO JAPANESE KESA ROBES
POSSIBLY EDO, 18TH/19TH CENTURY

The Buddhist vestments typically made from textile fragments; one with gold chrysanthemum on a blue ground, with small orange square panels including part of a dragon amongst clouds; the other with colourful peonies on an orange ground, with squares enclosing floral roundels, 108cm x 201cm and 113cm x 204cm respectively. (2)

Provenance: from the collection of Dr Richard Brown, and thence by descent.

Dr. Richard F. Brown (1898-1963) was a Canadian Anglican missionary doctor who served in China, most notably at St. Paul's Hospital in Henan, starting around 1930. During the Second Sino-Japanese War, he became a field doctor, providing urgent medical aid near the front lines and famously collaborating with fellow Canadian Dr. Norman Bethune in 1938 to treat wounded soldiers.