{"product_id":"maki-e-lacquer-hira-natsume-by-kiyose-ikko-fan-shiogama-motif-kin-sunago-interior","title":"Maki-e Lacquer Hira-Natsume by Kiyose Ikkō — Fan Shiogama Motif Kin-Sunago Interior","description":"Experience Authentic Japan Art with this Maki-e Tea Caddy. This Japanese Lacquerware serves as a Chanoyu Tea Ceremony Object and Collector's Lacquer Art piece, featuring Kyoto Maki-e Craftsmanship and Hira Natsume Form—a must-have for any Art Collector interested in Gold Lacquer Tea Ware, Japanese Tea Ceremony Antiques, or Signed Lacquerware with Tomobako.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e🔹 [ BASIC DETAILS ]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eArtist: Kiyose Ikkō (清瀬一光)\u003cbr\u003eTechnique: Maki-e (gold lacquer painting) on black urushi ground; kin-sunago (fine gold dust) interior\u003cbr\u003eEra: Late Shōwa to Heisei — a mid-career work from a Kyoto maki-e specialist\u003cbr\u003eOrigin: Kyoto, Japan\u003cbr\u003eDimensions: Height approx. 5.5 cm, Width approx. 8.5 cm\u003cbr\u003eBox: Signed paulownia tomobako, brushed inscription — \"扇塩釜蒔絵 平棗 一光\" — with artist's red seal\u003cbr\u003eCondition: Excellent. Lacquer surface retains full depth and sheen; no losses, chips, or repairs visible\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e🔹 [ CULTURAL \u0026amp; ARTISTIC INSIGHT ]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe hira-natsume — the flat, wide-lidded tea caddy — holds a particular place in usucha (thin tea) ceremony. Its low profile settles quietly on the tatami, offering the lid as a canvas. Kiyose Ikkō understood this: the entire upper face of this piece is given over to a single open sensu (folding fan), its ribs radiating from the lower edge in bright gold, the fan's interior field filled with a Shiogama coastal scene — gnarled pines on promontory, sea haze implied in the graduated ground.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShiogama, on the Miyagi coast, is a classical utamakura — a poetic place whose name resonates through waka and renga across a thousand years. Salt-fire smoke, pine silhouettes, the sound of tide: these images were already ancient when the Heian poets wrote them. Ikkō recasts that inheritance in urushi and gold, the sensu frame acting as a window — or a stage — through which the landscape is glimpsed rather than declared.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe interior is lined with kin-sunago, fine gold dust fixed into the lacquer ground, creating a warm, granular luminosity when the lid is lifted. This contrast — precise pictorial maki-e above, diffuse gold atmosphere within — is the piece's governing tension. The outside addresses the world of poetry and place; the inside addresses only the matcha it will hold.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eGold dust scattered in lacquer: a kind of silence that catches the light.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e🔹 [ DEEP-DIVE COMMENTARY ]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe natsume takes its name from the jujube fruit, whose rounded form the caddy echoes. Within chanoyu, the natsume is the standard container for usucha — thin tea prepared with a lighter ratio of matcha to water, served in informal or semi-formal settings. The hira-natsume (flat natsume) is a variant distinguished by its wider, lower profile: the diameter exceeds the height, and the lid's curvature is gentler, giving the decorator proportionally more surface to work with.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eMaki-e as a technique encompasses several distinct processes, often layered in a single piece. In shitamaki (underpainting), the design is first laid down in lacquer as a raised foundation. Nakamaki (intermediate application) builds volume and refines edges. Uwamaki (top coat) fixes the final gold or silver powders, while togidashi maki-e — where the surface is polished back to reveal the design flush with the lacquer ground — creates the characteristic matte-satin quality visible in the Shiogama pines on this natsume. The fan ribs, by contrast, are left as raised hiramaki-e lines, giving them structural presence against the flat picture ground.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eKiyose Ikkō worked within the Kyoto maki-e tradition, a lineage that prizes pictorial refinement and the integration of classical literary themes into functional tea objects. Kyoto maki-e differs from Wajima or Kamakura work in its emphasis on narrative image over abstract pattern — the object is expected to carry cultural memory as well as matcha.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eShiogama as a motif carries specific weight. The Shiogama Shrine, the pine-covered coast, the salt-boiling imagery associated with the place — all appear in the Manyoshu, the Kokinshū, and the Hyakunin Isshu. For a tea practitioner, encountering this image on a natsume is an act of recognition: the landscape is not decorative, it is a reference. The sensu frame intensifies this: the fan in Japanese aesthetics is both a physical object and a concentrating device, a way of framing and presenting something within ceremony.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor collectors, mid-career Kyoto maki-e lacquerware of this quality — signed, boxed, in excellent condition — represents a category where craftsmanship density remains accessible relative to National Living Treasure-level work, while still embodying the full technical and cultural vocabulary of the tradition.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e[ 日本語解説 ]\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e作者：清瀬一光（京蒔絵師）\u003cbr\u003e技法：黒漆地金蒔絵（扇塩釜蒔絵）／内金砂子\u003cbr\u003e制作年代：昭和後期〜平成期（中堅期の作）\u003cbr\u003e産地：京都\u003cbr\u003eサイズ：高さ約5.5cm、幅約8.5cm\u003cbr\u003e箱：共箱（箱書「扇塩釜蒔絵 平棗 一光」、印あり）\u003cbr\u003e状態：美品。漆面の艶・深みとも健在。欠けや補修の痕跡なし。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e平棗は薄茶器の一形式で、高さよりも径が勝る扁平な形状が特徴です。蓋の面積が広く取れるため、絵師にとっては一幅の画面として機能します。本作では蓋面いっぱいに大きな金蒔絵の扇が広げられ、その扇面の内に塩釜の風景——磯松、海霞、古歌が染み込んだ場所——が精緻に描き込まれています。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e塩釜は歌枕として知られる地です。万葉集以来、塩焼く煙と松原の取り合わせは、日本詩歌における「距離と懐かしさ」の象徴として繰り返し詠まれてきました。一光はその記憶を漆と金で再び呼び起こし、扇という「枠」によって風景を「見せる」のではなく「差し出す」構成を選んでいます。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e技法面では、松の描写に研ぎ出し蒔絵の要素が見られ、塗り重ねた漆を研ぎ戻すことで生まれるマットな金の質感が、ハイライトとして機能しています。扇の骨は平蒔絵の細線で表わされ、地の黒漆に対して立体感を与えています。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e内側の金砂子は、細かな金粉を漆に定着させた仕上げで、蓋を開けるたびに温かみのある粒状の輝きが広がります。外の絵画性と内の無名の光——その対比が、本作の静かな核心です。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e共箱の箱書と印は作者本人によるもので、真作としての確度を高めています。京蒔絵の技術的語彙を持ちながら、茶道具としての佇まいを損なわない一作です。\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e🔹 [ SHIPPING \u0026amp; PACKAGING ]\u003cbr\u003e• Dispatch: Within 1-6 business days\u003cbr\u003e• Carrier: Japan Post EMS \/ UPS (with tracking)\u003cbr\u003e• Packaging: Carefully wrapped with protective materials","brand":"The Modern Zen Archive","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":61823973032306,"sku":"260502_a_2799","price":1729.0,"currency_code":"AED","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0960\/5680\/3698\/files\/m84260821719_1.jpg?v=1777721536","url":"https:\/\/checkout.themodernzenarchive.com\/products\/maki-e-lacquer-hira-natsume-by-kiyose-ikko-fan-shiogama-motif-kin-sunago-interior","provider":"The Modern Zen Archive","version":"1.0","type":"link"}