Length: 30.500 cm
Width:
24.300 cm
Height: 6.200
cm
Gift of Dr Bernhard Landan
Asia JA 1946.10-12.1.a-c
Lacquer document box
From Japan
Edo period,
19th century AD
The interlocking design of black crows and white egrets is very unusual, and has no real precedent in Japanese art. However, it does have something in common with the painting of the Rimpa school, and can be placed in the tradition of depicting flocks of birds on Japanese screens, common from the seventeenth century onwards.
The crows' eyes, inlaid with gold lacquer and mother-of pearl, and the conspicuous pinkish bills of the egrets both help us to pick out the birds from the puzzling design.
L. Smith, V. Harris and T. Clark, Japanese art: masterpieces in (London, The British Museum Press, 1990)
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