Important Pair of Arita Porcelain Vases

A rare and highly important pair of early 18th-century Japanese porcelain vases and covers, executed in underglaze cobalt blue on a white ground and deliberately left partially unfinished. Of imposing baluster form, each vase rises to an elaborate pierced cover surmounted by a finely modelled mythical Temple Lion (shishi), symbols traditionally associated with protection, strength, and imperial authority in East Asian decorative arts.

The bodies are richly painted with scrolling floral ornament and stylised foliage, interrupted by broad unglazed reserves intentionally left blank for subsequent decoration. This unusual state reflects a fascinating and highly specialised aspect of early Japanese export porcelain production during the Edo period. Such wares were conceived as collaborative objects, intended to receive further embellishment either in Japan or upon arrival in Europe, where decorators — often referred to as “clobber artists” — would enrich the vacant reserves with lacquerwork, enamelling, or polychrome painting according to contemporary taste.

Comparable unfinished Arita porcelains are illustrated in major museum collections and scholarly publications, where the reserved panels were intended to be transformed into luxuriant floral or figural cartouches floating amidst the cobalt decoration. In some cases these additions were never executed, leaving the wares in a striking intermediary state that reveals both the technical process and the evolving dialogue between Japanese makers and European markets during the great age of export porcelain.

The present pair is particularly notable for the sculptural ambition of the covers, the dramatic contrast between the densely painted cobalt ornament and the untouched biscuit reserves, and their exceptional scale. The unfinished surfaces lend the vases an unexpectedly modern aesthetic quality while simultaneously preserving rare evidence of 18th-century decorative practices and international artistic exchange.

Japan, Arita, early 18th century.

Height: 63 cm (25 in.).