A JAPANESE GOLD AND BROWN LACQUER TWO-CASE INRO BY MIZUTANI SHUTOHO

A JAPANESE GOLD AND BROWN LACQUER TWO-CASE INRO BY MIZUTANI SHUTOHO

EDO PERIOD, 18TH CENTURY

The wide body decorated with gold takamaki-e, black and red lacquer and raden mother of pearl inlays on the rich chocolate-brown ground, one side with a large cockerel and a hen and the other with large flowers and foliage, the flanges to the interior decorated with cracked-ice patterns, the base with a six-character signature for Mizutani Shutoho, with a filigree metal ojime and a wood netsuke carved in openwork with views of thatched buildings by pine trees, together with a kiri box, the inro 7.6cm. (2)

Provenance: an English private collection, Somerset.

See Bonhams, London, The Edward Wrangham Collection of Japanese Art, Part IV, for a related inro by Mizutani Shutoho decorated with chickens.