λ TWO JAPANESE IVORY NETSUKE OF TIGERS

MEIJI PERIOD, 19TH CENTURY

Both carved as a larger feline and its two young, realistically modelled and with the ivory stained to imitate the stripes, their eyes inlaid in mother of pearl, both signed to the back Hakuryu in a gourd-shaped reserve, 4.6cm and 4cm respectively. (2)

Provenance: from the collection of a lady of title, and thence by descent.

Cf. F Meinertzhagen, The Meinertzhagen Card Index on Netsuke in the Archives of the British Museum, Part A, p.120, for other examples of tiger netsuke by Hakuryu.