Ornamental Panel “Mount Fuji”

From the 1850s, Kawamoto Masukichi was a leading artist in the factories in Seto, producing export ceramics, first for America and later for Europe. His bravura pieces were created on official commission from the Japanese government for major exhibitions in- and outside Japan. The “Fuji Plate”, made for the 1873 Vienna World’s Fair, was the first of these prestigious objects, and, in comparison with those made later, it is also the smallest. Its particularly striking feature is the style of painting; Masukichi combines a Western rendering of three-dimensionality and perspective with Hokusai’s pictorial tradition.