An ivory netsuke of Ebisu and Daikoku


By Ohara Mitsuhiro (1810-1875), Osaka, Edo period (1615-1868), 19th centuryOf compact form, Daikoku standing with a large sack on his back and holding his mallet while Ebisu wrestles with a giant carp, the ivory lightly stained and the carp's one visible eye of mother-of-pearl with dark pupil; signed Mitsuhiro with a poet-shaped kao. 3.8cm (1½in) high.
|The kao as a suffix to the signature is the rarely seen one in the form of a seated poet, as illustrated in George Lazarnick, Netsuke and Inro Artists and How to Read Their Signatures, Honolulu, Reed Publishers, 1982, "d" on p.775.