Circa 1890 Japanese Woven Metal Plate
£225
This is one of our favourite discoveries, it dates to around 1890 and is a rare item, examples of Japanese woven mixed metals for everyday objects such as trays, plates and baskets that are also combined with finely decorated, chased metal and lacquer do not turn up often. this is best described as being in the Shakudo tradition.
The whole item is made of metal, the basket weave is strips of metal intricately woven and threaded into a thin bronze base plate. there is a red almost cinnabar lacquer colour in evidence as a finish to both the weave and the decorated platten, the dark visible in the photos is age patina.
It has been described as a 'plate' form, although it does have a raised edge which we would associate with a low rise dish.
This is remarkably in excellent condition, there is no break to the basket weave, no unravelling or loose fitting to the base. The decoration is in good order and as far as we can tell no loss to the lacquer colour.
The overall diameter is 210mm (8 1/4 inches) the height of the basket weave is 28 mm (just over 1 inch)
Shakudo is an ancient Japanese art form a technique, gold and copper alloys inlaid on a dark copper base, most often depict scenes from the natural world. This isn't inlaid, it is finely carved / chased from the flat bronze sheet but the decorative form and materials are certainly in the Shakudo tradition popular during the aesthetic period, 1880 to about 1900, when Japanese jewelry artisans were banned from sword decorating.
We have only applied a light, non aggressive clean to expose the fine decorative nature of this piece, the photographs do show how the accumulated dirt of the past hundred plus years has hidden the extent of the fine carving. Under a magnifier we have seen how the artist has combined the lacquer as well as the bare metal to create colour and interest. It could be taken further, more of the gold tone could be polished up, however we have a policy of not going beyond a good clean, leaving the choice of how much age and patina the new owner would want.