Kinkozan Vase?

[bokaba]

Here is a vase I recently purchased. It has a Kinkozan handwritten mark on the bottom. The decoration appears good and there is gold work. I am thinking early 20th Century.

[Stan]

I still have my doubts, Kinkozan was highly skilled and his level of skill still goes unmatched, the decoration is just not as good as similar items i have seen, he did use a dark cobalt blue on a lot of his pottery all though the quality is not their on yours and the mark on the bottom looks like it was added later, it is not like other marks I have seen by him, sorry to say.

[bokaba]

I agree Stan. Most of the Kinkozan vases I have seen in catalogues and museums are of great quality. This piece is decent, better than a lot of mass market type satsuma and Awata type wares I have seen. Here are some pieces from the Gotheborg website claimed to be Kinkozan tsukuru that don't look too impressive to me. Gotheborg dates them as late 1920s. Perhaps they are not from Kinkozan V, but other factories trying to bootstrap to the popularity of Kinkozan when it closed in 1927.


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[heavenguy]

Yep, the Kinkozan mark was highly detailed especially by the end of his studio company. They closed the studio in 1927 but by they they were making more Art Nouveau than "Satsuma ware"  The Pictorial seems as Stan said, not the quality you expect from a Kinkozan. They used mostly cartouches or elaborated cartouches for the mark. That type of mark can be seen in very early Kinkozan ware but not at his peak of his career. So it makes me doubt too if they added the mark to a Satsuma ware.

[bokaba]

Even if not Kinkozan, how old do you think this vase is?

[heavenguy]

In my opinion. It's Meiji period late 19th century. Even if it's not high end quality, it's still quality. Unfortunately losing gold gilt removes value from the piece since it part of its charm.

[Stan]

I agree heavenguy, it still is a very nice example of a satsuma style vase.