Wakashima Takao shunjuu maki-e natsume — cherry blossoms and maple leaves in gold on black lacquer, gold nashiji interior — Tier 2 maki-e artist, signed tomobako. Japanese tea caddy, chado, matcha temae, sakura momiji, kin-nashiji, antique lacquerware, wabi-sabi, signed lacquer box.
🔹 [ BASIC DETAILS ] • Artist: Wakashima Takao (若島孝雄) — Tier 2 certified maki-e lacquer artist • Type: Natsume (棗) tea caddy — standard format • Motif: Shunjuu (春秋) — cherry blossoms (spring) and maple leaves (autumn) in flowing gold maki-e, with pink and red pigment accents • Interior: Gold nashiji (kin-nashiji) — full gold inner surface • Lacquer: Deep black ground with flowing maki-e across lid and body • Condition: Good — lacquer surface vibrant, maki-e and gold interior fully preserved • Provenance: Signed tomobako (共箱) reading 棗 / 孝雄 • Dimensions: H approx. 7.6 cm × D approx. 7.4 cm
🔹 [ CULTURAL INSIGHT ] Shunjuu — spring and autumn held in the same breath — is one of the oldest compositional subjects in Japanese craft. The cherry blossom carries everything that blooms and falls. The maple leaf carries everything that burns before going dark. On a natsume, a vessel held at the center of the tea ceremony, this pairing is not sentiment. It is a meditation on time: the entire year, the whole arc of transience, compressed into a surface you can hold in your palm. The gold interior is not extravagance. It is the warmth that waits inside impermanence.
🔹 [ DEEP-DIVE ] Wakashima Takao's brushwork operates at the edge of the legible and the lyrical. The sakura and momiji do not merely appear on the black lacquer ground — they move across it, as if carried by a wind the viewer cannot feel but recognizes. Pink and red accents on select petals and leaves are applied with restraint: enough to locate the season, not enough to insist upon it. The kin-nashiji interior — the gold "pear-skin" ground — is a structural argument: the beauty the eye sees from outside is answered by the beauty that only the hand discovers when the lid is lifted. Tomobako reads 棗 / 孝雄. The piece is a complete statement.
🔹 [ SHIPPING & PACKAGING ] • Dispatch: Within 1-6 business days • Carrier: Japan Post EMS / UPS (with tracking) • Packaging: Carefully wrapped with protective materials
