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The particular dragon & enamel colors are uncommon, the "crinkle cloud" background diaper seems to have disappeared from use by mid-1970s... but what does the inscription reveal?

The inscription appears to be Japanese, and I presume the vase may be too. I can't provide accurate phonetic transcription of the characters into Japanese, so will stick to my English translation:

贈 工勝先生 - Presented to the winner

昭和三十年一月五日 - January 5th, Showa 30 [1956]

武徳報社 - Martial Arts Publishing House

Improvements by our Japanese contributors always are welcome.

Cheers,

Bill H.

This is one of those things that makes the 1950s so interesting with respect to cloisonne. The design has Chinese motifs and construction, but also non-Beijing style characteristics. Despite the Japanese inscription, is this yet another example of the effort to revive and modernize the Beijing workshops? But somehow I can't see a Japanese person shopping for it in Maoist Beijing of the early 1950s...the horrors of World War II were still less than ten years past.
So if it isn't a Beijing piece, where else could it have been made? The Japanese of course occupied Taiwan for half a century, and there do seem to have been cloisonne workshops in Taiwan during the 1950s, so it doesn't seem unreasonable that cloisonne studios there would have been influenced by Japanese drawing styles and enamels.
A prize for a martial arts tournament...where and when?
Yet another little mystery likely to remain unsolved?
Beijing? Kyoto? Taiwan? Hong Kong?

As the inscription is in Japanese and the term 先生 is included, I'm wondering if this wasn't presented to a martial arts instructor with the name 工榺, though I don't know how that name is pronounced in Japanese.

serves me right to look at the inscription so hastily, disregard my previous post, I think Super has the inscription right.

Please understand that I do not know how to read Japanese either and therefore anything I post here can indeed be inaccurate(if they were indeed Japanese) and therefore by no means any of my postings here are intended to be disrespects to the other two posters.

First of all, I believe the third character from the left of "贈 工勝先生", is 藤 instead of 勝. Therefore it may be translated as "Gifted to Mr. Kudo 工藤".

Secondly, I believe instead of Showa Year 30 (1956) it appears to me it may be Showa Year 20 (1946) instead. The date is indeed Jan. 5th, 1946, right after the Japanese surrender on Sept. 2, 1945. (*Please correct me if I am wrong)

Thirdly, 武徳報社, while the first two characters may indeed sound like having something to do with the virtues of martial arts (may be it did), however 報社 means a newspaper publisher and 武徳 is the name of this newspaper publisher. If you would google 武徳報社, one would learn that after the Japanese had occupied Beijiang, China in 1940, there was a cartoon publisher named 武徳報社 in Beijiang, China, apparently under the direct supervision of the Japanese military, which had been publishing the "Beijiang Cartoons" or "Beijiang Manhua" 北京漫画 since 1940.

http://mitizane.ll.chiba-u.jp/metadb/up/BA31027730/2012no.250_58_75.pdf

http://mitizane.ll.chiba-u.jp/metadb/up/BA31027730/2010no.207_44_58.pdf

All these made me believe that while the person to whom this vase was gifted was indeed a Japanese, probably somebody who had something to do with the "Beijian Manhua" magazine, however I believe the carvings were possibly being carved in Chinese and the vase was made in Beijiang, China at around 1946. Of course, I can be wrong and would stand corrected if that is indeed the case.

Again, no pun intended. Hope this helps.

Super

Super, you're right on both counts. Every time I think I'm smart enough to do this stuff without the dictionary open, you bring me back to the real world.

Thanks,

Bill H.

Hi, Bill:

Don't worry, every time I thought I had it down packed I would make some silly errors myself. Therefore, now I always took my time and tried to find as much details as I could. You have been doing a great job in translating some really tough staff and should be commended. Super

Went on an image hunt for cloisonne dragon bottles and vases that shared characteristics with the inscribed vase. Am working on a blog post with more extensive examples, but the 3 pictures below seem to present the gist, i.e., that while the workmanship seems to be Chinese, whoever drew the dragon on this vase was either Japanese or a Chinese artisan trying to adapt a Japanese sketch.
Chinese cloisonne dragon iconography is resolutely consistent over the first 50 years of the 20th century, as are the designs for adapting a curling dragon to the shape of the vase or bottle.
This bottle, on the other hand, shows a rather clumsy composition and execution - notice how the artisan neglected to make the red segments jaw edge segments align in a smooth curve. Other more Japanese features include the general design of the head - notice the eye brows and horns - thick body, huge feet with detailed scales and separate claws (even though they're 5-toed Chinese dragons and not the typical 3-toed Japanese versions), lightning bolts (?) emerging from the legs and body...
And, unlike Chinese dragon vases, the two dragons don't exactly match.

I can understand this vase being made in 1946, but not 1956. I wonder if the Japanese cartoonist sketched the dragons?

First pic shows small Chinese bottles with mustard or beige enamel probably from the 1930s-40s.
Second pic shows a Chinese cloud and dragon composition that does not change throughout the decades from circa World War I - 1950.
Third pic compares inscription vase with a pair of Japanese vases.

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