Printed from Woolley & Wallis

Description

SHIBATA ZESHIN (1807-91)
KAWANABE KYŌSAI (1831-89)
AND OTHERS
EDO/MEIJI, 19TH CENTURY

A rare Japanese collaborative makimono (handscroll painting), ink and colour on paper, with a title slip inscribed Kinsei Meika gassaku ga makimono (Collaborative Painting Scroll by Renowned Artists of the Early Modern Period), featuring eleven sketches by various artists, including Shibata Zeshin, Kawanabe Kyōsai, Sato Genran and others, 28cm x 494cm.

Provenance: from the Estate of a Collector, Heath House, Hampshire, and thence by descent. By repute, acquired in Asia at the turn of the 19th century.

The scroll contains the following:

-1/ Shibata Zeshin (1807-91), a depiction of Hotei, the God of Good Fortune standing, holding his large sack of treasures over his shoulder, signed Zeshin;
-2/ Shibata Zeshin (1807-91), branches of pine, signed Zeshin;
-3/ Kawanabe Kyōsai (1831-89), Hotei dreaming of Ebisu carrying the Goddess Okame on his back, signed Seisei Kyōsai ga;
-4/ Shibata Nankoku (1802-73), a mountainous river landscape to the right and a horse rider and attendants in a snow landscape to the left, signed Nankoku;
-5/ Kawabata Gyokusho (1842-1913), a large standing deer, signed Gyokusho;
-6/ Sato Genran (1818-85), Shoki and an oni, the demon carrying a bunch of irises, signed Genran;
-7/ an unsigned depiction of Mount Fuji;
-8/ Kawanabe Kyōsai (1831-89), another depiction of Okame wearing colourful robes, signed Seisei Kyōsai ga and with a red seal Bankokuhi ('Flying all over the world') in the shape of crows;
-9/ Sato Genran (1818-85), tortoises and flowering prunus, signed Genran sanjin (Genran the Mountain Man);
-10/ Kawanabe Kyōsai (1831-89), the Goddess Bishamonten pouring sake for Jurojin, signed Seisei Kyosai ga;
-11/ and an unsigned painting of radishes.