An outstanding exhibition quality Meiji period silk embroidery of a lion and lioness.

An outstanding exhibition quality Meiji period silk embroidery of a lion and lioness. Worked in rich tones of cream, silver, gold and brown silk thread with black detailing, the powerfully drawn lion staring outwards and the lioness asleep. Within the original European giltwood frame.

Provenance: Footnote: For a very similar silk embroidery example see The Art of Meiji Era International Expositions 明治の万国博覧会の再現美術 (Meiji no bankoku kangyo hakurankai no saigen bijutsu ten Kiyomizu Sannenzaka Museum, Kyoto, 2010); the Kiyomizu Sannenzaka Museum’s lion embroidery work dimensions are 46.5 cm x 65.5 cm, with the embroidered signature “Kato 加藤” p60.
Another very similar panel with silk embroidery design of lions, Takashimaya Historical Museum, Bijutsu shishu byobu gaku, shashincho 42-049, see page 150 in the book THREADS OF SILK AND GOLD; ORNAMENTAL TEXTILE FROM MEIJI JAPAN, ASHMOLEAN MUSEUM EXHIBITION CATALOGUE (EAN 13: 978 1 85444 268 0), Ashmolean Museum, 2012, p150 fig.97.
Department Store, Kyoto, possibly based on an animal drawing by the famous Japanese painter Takeuchi Seiho 竹内 栖鳳(1864-1942) who exhibited a painting of Lion at the Philadelphia Expo, USA. A photograph of an anonymous embroidery artist at work is reproduced in the book IN LOTUS LAND JAPAN, published in 1910, London, as a travelogue guidebook on Japan by Herbert George Ponting (1870-1935).