Your comments on this f-g please ...

[docliss]

Your comments on this pair of fuchi-gashira would be greatly appreciated.

 

On a delicate, toad-skin ishime, copper surface, Shinnō is depicted in shishiai-bori on both pieces. On the fuchi, the hermit holds a silver brush and a tablet on which is visible part of the pa-qua. He has long, kebori hair, silver eyes and teeth, and gold ornamentation on his robe. There are vertical yasurime on the tenjō. A similar figure is depicted on the kashira, eating silver and shakudō bamboo. There are shakudō shitodome in situ.

 

A similar fuchi-gashira, no 64, is described on p. 36 and illustrated on p. 35 of Rucker’s catalogue of the Gōda Collection of Japanese Sword Fittings in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This latter pair is inscribed Issandō, with a gold seal for Nagaharu.

 

The quality of this work is stunning, with the join between the tenjō and the koshi of the fuchi almost undetectable. This quality, together with the presence of vertical yasurime on the tenjō, makes me wonder ….

 

Regards, John L.

[Ford Hallam]

Hi Dr John,

 

here are some images of accepted work by this artist. These used to be in the fittings museum in Tokyo and were part of an exhibition they had of the Nara San-saku.

 

 

 

 

 

[Ford Hallam]

and the last image...seems there's limit on 5 attachments per post

 

 

 

Hope these help in your assessment.

 

regards,

 

Ford

[Ford Hallam]

hmmm....well that didn't elicit much comment . Anyone see the differences? Just wondering.....

[docliss]

Ford, please accept my apologies for not having responded to your generous posting of the Joi examples - I was rather hoping for some more responses before replying myself. While agreeing that there is a certain lack of 'delicacy' in my own f-g, I do wonder if this is appropriate to the chosen subject, and am still not sure about its provenance. Like you, I also am waiting for some members to venture some comments!

 

John L.

[paulb]

Dear John and Ford,

As one of the least qualified people to assess fittings I can only offer a view based on aesthetic comparison and apparent execution. Johns FK while attractive lacks the cleanness/ sharpness of execution seen in the examples posted by Ford. The composition on Ford's examples fit the space better and creates a more harmonious whole.

I think the biggest difference is in cleanness of line and subtlety of the drawing.

 

Probably of little use but thought I would jump in with both feet!!

Paul B

[Ford Hallam]

Hi John,

 

please don't apologise, my prompt was directed more towards the rest of our interested members. The reason I specifically didn't comment on the comparisons offered was because I was hoping to stimulate exactly the sort of assessment Paul has offered.

 

You make some good points Paul, so you get a gold star

 

There is more to go on though..... The interesting thing about these sort of aesthetic judgements is that everyone can in fact see the evidence....without knowing anything specific about the artist in question. I'd suggest looking beyond the craft and looking more closely at the art.

 

regards

[Eric H]

Comparison

 

Eric

[Brian]

Ford,

Once again, I do find (and see from web stats) that resizing and allowing pics to display directly is so important to ppl spending time looking at pics and commenting on them.

Keep this in mind folks when uploading. Many read all the new topics daily, and may skim over a thread when pics require clicking to view. Keep those pics under 800 pix wide, and they won't turn into clickable links...will also load faster, and 72-96dpi is fine for most.

 

I resize and re-upload many pics here, but don't have the time or bandwidth to do many anymore.

 

Brian

[nagamaki - Franco]

hmmm....well that didn't elicit much comment . Anyone see the differences? Just wondering.....

 

Hello John, Ford, All,

 

Ford's posts left little to wonder about from my perspective. Simply from an artistic point of view the differences are marked and speak for themselves. John, your use of the word delicacy, or lack there of, is most appropriate not only on the basis of artistic impression, but especially when comparing the chisel workmanship. And, though I cannot speak in technical detail of how the end results were achieved exactly, my eye tells me that the finishing of the surfaces and quality of the metals are on substantially different levels. This is important in detail as one of these artists had higher ability and skill. Now, please don't misunderstand as my aim is not to knock this fuchi kashira set, but rather simply to say that they do not present themselves as 'upper level' work as do the text book examples, imho.

 

P.S. I won't talk about the mei, as it has been my experience that paying attention to signatures takes care of itself if the workmanship is correct.

[Soshin]

Comparison

 

Eric

In terms of the comparison of the mei between John's and Ford's I can tell that John's mei in the second kanji has some major balance issues in terms of the different sizes of the composite radicals. It really reminds me of my own Shodo work that my sensei would dislike in terms of its poor balance of the different composite radicals. The person writing the John's mei was likely not writing their own name which they likely would have practiced many times and would have had better redical balance. Just my impressions and observations of the different mei of the same name.

 

Yours truly,

David (Soshin)