Project Description

From the French collection shortly to be published as a catalogue on this website.  Not for sale before publication

Boxwood Netsuke of Tengu no Tamago, by Jobun

The artist’s individual take on the Tengu, entirely different from those of Toyomasa and his followers, seen in this catalogue. Jobun’s creation is a timid depressive, crouching in its shell, rather than rising out of it. Eye pupils inlaid in dark material
Signed. Edo. Circa 1800
Height: 4 cm
For a discussion of Jobun’s tengu and illustrations of several, see Milton Stratos’s article on the artist in International Netsuke Society Journal, 22/1, pp. 16-17, the present netsuke illustrated as n° 7
Literature:
Sydney L. Moss, Myth, Reality and Magical Transformation, n° 18
Idem, Outside the Box , n°16
S.L. Moss advetisement in International Netsuke Society Journal, 26/2, p.32
Provenance:
Sydney L. Moss, 2004, from whom purchased by the present owner, the result of a sleight of hand by Max Rutherston
MR4004