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I believe this figure to be Hirado. Any comments with respect to signature would be appreciated.

Seems to be a simplified form of FUKU (fortune) over a name TARO and then an illegible character. I am not 100% sure this is hirado, possibly Fukagawa ware of the mid 20th century.


Anthony M. Lee
Asian Art Research

Thank you for your comment. I'm not entirely convinced that this is Fukagawa. It may very well be but your dating to mid 20th century seems a bit to "modern" . Can you or anyone else offer to elaborate. Any additional assessments or upgrades would be appreciated.

Fukagawa? No, definitely not. That company was/is meticulous about marking its work. Since c.1900 the mark has, almost without exception, consisted of the company logo, either on its own or with text. In the very few exceptions to that rule, the piece is marked with the Fukagawa name in either kanji or Roman characters. The logo is a stylised Mt Fuji with a river below, said to be a play on the name - mountain-river = fuka-gawa. It is usually in underglaze blue or (more frequent on tableware) overglaze gilt, less often in overglaze red, all either hand-drawn or transfer printed; it is very rarely impressed. See examples below. Hope this helps.

Having said all that, this is a lovely piece, worthy of Fugagawa in terms of quality. The mouse is particularly finely modelled. Thanks for sharing it!

Beg to differ - Fukagawa may have been meticulous in marking all vessels (Vases, pots etc) but was not so with sculptural items and incense boxes, okimono and new years objects can all be found from the company that were not marked with the company logo and name. I am not saying this piece is necessarily Fukagawa. As well Fukagawa quality of painting can be found to have declined significantly after about 1940 and though they still produced some higher end pieces, cheaper small bud vases, wall vases and other pieces using cheap transfer printing were made by the company.

Anthony M. Lee
Asian Art Research

Mr Lee

Many thanks for the information - and for proving yet again the value of this Board. The day is wasted if one doesn't learn something new. I wasn't aware that Fukagawa produced figurines, okimono, etc., so I'll have to keep an eye open for examples.

Respectfully

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