Small Japanese Plate Unmarked - Kutani Look

[Kaaren B.]

This is a small delicate plate from another tag sale (last one of 2024!).

Very fine, thin porcelain, looks like a household scene, gold/white/red decoration, but unmarked. Very pretty gold touches on clothing. I thought it might be Kutani, but it is unarked.

The smudge in the middle of the bottom is where someone so kindly stuck a price label on that was so sticky I still have not gotten some of it off.

Is anyone able to suggest a maker or age? Many thanks, as always, and a Happy New Year to all.

Kaaren

[peterp]

These are two different dishes, are they?
They are playing Go on the table?
This is what I would call a scholar decoration, typical Chinese, people wearing Chinese attire. But the rim looks indeed more Japanese.
Is the red color applied later to cover some faded gilt or other color decoration? If it were not there,  I would think this to be a candidate for Canton export. Is there gilt on the red color of the round red decoration on the lower rim of the item in the second picture.
Could also be a Japanese imitation of a Chinese motif...

Did you try acetone for removing the label glue? A nail polish remover? 

[Kaaren B.]

Hi, Peter and thank you. It is the same dish, just the bottom and the top. I also thought the bottom didn't look Chinese so didn't know where to put it on the site. The foot rim does show a bit of roughness to wear, and is squared off.

By touch, all the gold appears to be under the glaze.

Yes, there is gilt around the red sections of the rim decoration, although faded in some places, and also around the little flowers inside the pale yellow sections of the border decoration. I almost wondered if this were famille verte? Except that there are no birds or insects . . . 

The little gold "star" decorations on the clothing also look like what is on the clothes on my Japanese censer bowl - hence, my confusion.

Sorry I put it in the Japanese section - I simply wasn't sure what it was.

I'll try some nail polish remover on that label residue.

K.

[peterp]

Hi Kaaren,
Can you clarify this? When asking about whether it was one or two dishes I meant the lower two images, showing the decoration. For example, one of the men at the table shows a red garment (in the middle image), but the same shows a garment with gilt in the lower one. The red garment of the one on the right looks as if there was something (gilt?) on his right shoulder. One of them shows gilt on the table, the other not... it must be two different dishes, I would think.

Further, I have been thinking if the red color roundels originally might have shown coins with a square hole, but if there was something else on top, then it is more unlikely. The patterns on the clothing were sometimes similar, in certain periods, it is difficult to judge origin based on these.
And, the shape is typical Chinese, but I still am not sure if it is Japanese with a Chinese motif or if it is Chinese, due to the rim decoration which looks like nothing I have seen up to now.

And no, basically gilt can only be on top of the glaze because its firing temperature is lower than that of the glaze and it would likely evaporate in the kiln. If there is something transparent over it, it might be some resin cover added in more recent times, which would not have required firing.

[Kaaren B.]

Thanks for the clarification, Peter. It is indeed one dish. I took a farther away picture to show the whole, and then a closeup of the center for detail.

I can't speak to the red roundels in the border sections, except to say that the starry bits and lines seem to be evenly dispersed over both  ends of the roundels, and the lines to intersect in the border between them.

Each of the red jackets shown have gilt on them, in fact every article of clothing shows gilt, either lines or the starry things - even the narrow black bits on sleeve and collars are outlines in gilt, perhaps it did not show up well in different areas of the photo.

I have the plate on my desk, and if I tilt it away from the desk lamp, the gold does dull out a bit.

The gentleman on the right has behind his right shoulder the legs of the stool upon which the upper right hand gentleman is seated.

Just about everything in the picture is outlined in gilt, except for the shoes, the teapot, and the door to the outside, but in many places the gilt is faded so you must be right about it being on top of the glaze, I just can't really feel it.

I thought it so odd that something that obviously was hand-painted with so much delicacy, and that looks like egg-shell porcelain, wouldn't be marked.

Thank you for taking the trouble to consider this.  K.