A fine Kakiemon dish | Edo period, late 17th century

The Japanese ceramics historian Hayashiya Seizo (1928-2017) identified the scene depicted in this dish as the bay of Matsushima, Miyagi Prefecture, one the Three Views of Japan (Nihon sankei), renowned for its striking cluster of small islands strewn with pine and coastal groves.

For a similar example in the collection of the Gardiner Museum, Toronto, object number G10.3.31, go to:

https://emuseum.gardinermuseum.com/objects/3061/dish-with-pines-and-boats?ctx=c8109696da5d6503ba14b22d8c0c77a25adb4ca5&idx=88

For further reading and examples of similar dishes, see:

Soame Jenyns, The Polychrome Wares Associated with the Potters Kakiemon, Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society 1937-1938, XIV (London, 1938), no. 8a.

William Bowyer Honey, The Ceramic Art of China and Other Countries of the Far East (London, 1945), no. 181b.

Victor Rienaecker, The Richard de la Mare Collection of Japanese Ceramic Wares, Part 1, Apollo (November, 1946), fig. VIII.

Catalogue of an Exhibition of Japanese porcelain, intro. by Soame Jenyns (London, the Oriental Ceramic Society, 1956), cat. no. 134.

Soame Jenyns, Japanese Porcelain (London, 1965), pl. A and cover of paper dust jacket.

Hayashiya Seizo, Kakiemon/Nabeshima, vol. 6 of Nihon no toji (Japanese ceramics) (Tokyo, 1972), pl. 143.

Hayashi Seizo, Kakiemon, vol. 9 of Nihon no toji (Tokyo, 1974), pl. 143.

Nishida Hiroko, Kakiemon, vol. 24 of Nihon toji Zenshu (Tokyo, 1977), pl. 56.