A Japanese figure of benkei. Edo, circa 1700

The moulded and modelled figure of Benkei on carp has its mouth slightly opened, protruding eyes, moulded nostrils, raised fins, incised scales along the body. It is sitting on its curved caudal fin, the carp with a figure of a boy moulded with arms and legs gripping around its belly. The carp is leaping from a wave-shaped plinth, which was moulded separately.

The figure is decorated in overglaze polychrome enamels, the carp with mouths heightened in bright red, the fins and tail in gold, and traces of aubergine enamel painted on the eyes and along the body. The boy expresses an angry face, with eyes and nose heightened in brown, and mouth in bright red, wearing a headdress delineated in bright red, and a sort of cape, outlined in vivid red, and dotted in aubergine, green and black enamels. The hollow plinth is naturalistically moulded suggesting waves and painted in green and aubergine enamels. The plinth was moulded separately from the figure.

COUNTRY : Japan

PERIOD : Edo (1602-1868), circa 1700

MATERIAL : Porcelain

SIZE : 22 cm

REFERENCE : E823

PROVENANCE : from a European collection

STATUT : sold

Related works :

A similar pair of Benkei riding a leaping carp is in the Groninger Museum, Groningen.

Three others figures were published by Jorge Welsh and Luisa Vinais in Okimono: Japanese Porcelain Figures from the Edo Period, 2022, p. 178-181.

Another pair was in the former Leo & Doris Hodroff Collection and published by David Howard in The Choice of the Private Trader. The Private Market in Chinese Export Porcelain illustrated from the Hodroff Collection, London, 1994, p. 280, no. 339.

Additonal informations :

Oniwakamaru (young demon) is a popular figure in Japanese folklore. He was as a warrior-monk who lived during the 12th century and is often depicted as a young boy. In many stories, he is on a quest for revenge for the death of his mother. He was the son of a priest of Kumano, in Kii, and it is said that while a young student at the temple, he discovered that a giant carp had eaten his mother near the Bishamon Waterfall. He left the temple and looked for the carp to avenge her death. He became later Benkei, the legendary 12th century giant warrior monk (sohei), famous for his supernatural strength equivalent to that of one hundred men.

He is represented on the group wearing a fighter’s cloth band around his shaven head, has a facial expression of menacing determination, and is wearing a loose kimono revealing a bare arm and shoulder.

A Japanese figure of benkei. Edo, circa 1700

Demande de condition report

Question about condition report