Bol en forme de bronze antique chinois

Aoki, Mokubei 青木 木米

Entre 1761 et 1833
Grès, Glaçure = Couverte
Bol
H. 10 x D. 16 cm
Cachet imprimé sur le flanc intérieur du pied : "Mokubei" 木米
M.C. 4228
Legs, Cernuschi, Henri

Aoki Mokubei is one of the great artists of the first half of the 19th century. His work reflects the powerful influence of Chinese culture in Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate. Mokubei was trained and educated with artists and intellectuals including Kō Fuyō (1722-84), Tanomura Chikuden (1771-1831) and Kimura Kenkadō (1736-1802), and was influenced by Okuda Eisen (1753-1811), with whom he may have studied the art of pottery. He became a ceramicist, calligrapher and painter and a follower of the Nanga school, which admired traditional Chinese culture. Mokubei is highly representative of the multi-skilled artists of this trend, which focused on a culture and lifestyle rather than a specialised artistic field. They challenged the work of Japanese artists of the previous period, notably with regard to the aesthetic developed in the various tea ceremony schools (chanoyu), which they countered with the art of preparing sencha, or infused green tea, in the manner of the Chinese literati. The use of sencha is said to have been introduced into Japan by the Zen monk Yinyuan in 1654.
Not only did Mokubei excel in various arts, notably calligraphy, but he also left ceramic pieces that he made using a variety of techniques. Mokubei, who was one of the first ceramicists of Kyōto to produce celadons, remembered, when making this bowl, that numerous Chinese celadons dating back to the Song period imitated the shape of antique vessels: the reason for this was that celadons, probably because their colour was reminiscent of the patina of certain antique bronze wares, are thought to have originally been made as substitutes for bronze. Before Mokubei, the great Kyōto ceramicist Okuda Eisen (1753-1811) had already drawn inspiration from the shape of antique bronzes to make porcelains glazed with enamel in the style of the popular works of the Ming dynasty (1368-1644).

 

Reference(s) : Michel Maucuer (Musée Cernuschi), Céramiques japonaises : un choix dans les collections du Musée Cernuschi, Paris, Paris Musées, 2010. p. 97, 5: VI.
Michel Maucuer, Henri Cernuschi 1821 – 1896, voyageur et collectionneur, Paris, Paris Musées, 1998, no. 109, p. 124, ill. p. 125.
Michel Maucuer, "Kyoto Ceramics of the Late Edo Period in the Henri Cernuschi Collection", in Orientations, vol. 23, no. 8, August 1992, pp. 37- 41. 
Author of the record : Michel Maucuer
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