Vintage Japanese Kutani Moriage Porcelain Okimono of Nobel Man | Signed

Sale price$75.00

Dimensions: 4-3/*’w x 2-1/2”d x 3-1/2”h.

This piece was probably made in the mid-20th century during the Showa period. The porcelain figure is about 50-60 years old, illustrating a wonderful treatment of ‘Mori’ which is an ornate textured pattern introduced by the Kutani artisans. Moriage is often used with gold incorporated into the figurine. After being painted in enamels and decorated in “mori” fashion, it is glazed and fired in a kiln. Signed by hand on the bottom with the Kutani red signature only used in 1930.

Vintage Condition: Excellent as originally made. “As is” and retains the original craft/workmanship. Any discoloration, chipping/cracking, surface wear, or structural damage noted. 

NOTE: Ko-Kutani is a style of Japanese porcelain traditionally from Kutani, now a part of Kaga, Ishikawa, in the former Kaga Province, and was made in Japan after the mid-seventeenth century. Most of the pieces found today are nineteenth-century for which dealers and collectors often use the term Kutani to refer to just the latter. These pieces continue the tradition of beautifully colored and muted pieces decorated with red, green, black, and gold representations of noblemen, warriors, animals, and birds.

Different over-glazing techniques dominate the 19th/c form of Kutani:

Mokubei style was influenced by Chinese ink techniques.

Yoshidaya style is identified with colors of green, yellow, purple, and dark blue as the basis.

Eiraku style is a contrast to the Yoshidaya style with its simplistic coatings of gold on the first coat of red color.

Lidaya style, or the Hachirode, which breaks away from the conventional nature-themed Kutani style, with minute paintings of human figures on a red-gold aka-e kinran-de mix background.

Shoza style was a blend of all four techniques of overglazing.