Soten Kinko Tsuba
K0073
SOLD
A marvelous (a word I seldom use) shakudo tsuba by Soten. Signed, Eshu Hikone Ju Mogarashi Soten. 7.97 cm x 7.4 cm x 3.9 mm. Blue black shakudo plate, carved, with taka zogan and nunome gold silver red copper. Wonderful detail. Unlike so many, where the faces are reduced to three slits for the eyes and mouth, these faces are sculpted. Shakudo sekigane with vertical pattern in the hitsuana, and copper sekigane in the chukensettsu. So it was obviously mounted at one time. Wonderful, like new condition.
The school was founded by Shuten, and the first mei was Kitagawa Uji Soten. He was born in Kyoto, and later lived in Goshu (Omi province) Hikone, and was the originator of style of work referred to as Hikone bori. He is of the Go of Soheishi (Mogarashi). He was followed by Soken, Soju, Sochin, Kanenori, nado. There is a story that Soten resided in Kyoto during the Edo period, after Genroku (1688 -1704), when this type of complicated and gaudy works were highly prized.
In my fifty years of doing this, this is the best Soten that I have ever seen. This is about as good as it gets for this type of work.
