Important covered cup. Arita, Japan, Edo period (18th century).

Important covered cup. Arita, Japan, Edo period (18th century).
Kakiemon style porcelain.
Gilt bronze mount, France, 19th century.
In very good state of preservation according to its age.
Similar models are kept in the Musée du Louvre.
Measurements: 67 x 32 x 32 cm.

Exceptional covered cup made of Arita porcelain during the Edo period, decorated in overglaze enamels in the refined language of the Kakiemon style, and then mounted on a sumptuous gilded bronze structure of European manufacture of the nineteenth century.

The porcelain has a milky white background of great purity, characteristic of Hizen's production for both the domestic and export markets. The decoration develops court scenes with characters in dialogue, accompanied by a blue shishi lion and plum blossoms, executed with a harmonious palette of green, iron red and soft mauve tones. The whole is organized in registers, alternating figurative reserves and floral panels in blue underglaze and enamels, in a composition of great elegance and spatial lightness, typical of the mature Kakiemon.

The bronze mount, made in Europe in the 19th century, transforms the piece into an object of historicist taste. The stand has claw feet, tripod body with engraved vegetal decoration and an openwork leaf frieze. The lid is topped with an artichoke-shaped handle supported by naturalistic leaves, following the French neo-Rococo ornamental repertoire. This type of mountings responded to the European taste for oriental porcelain, elevating the vessels to the category of decorative salon pieces.

The combination of 18th century Japanese porcelain with 19th century French mounts was especially appreciated in France, England and the Netherlands, becoming part of aristocratic and bourgeois collections.

A comparable example is preserved in European public collections, including the Musée du Louvre, underlining the typological relevance of this model.